The Shattering of Oz
by Straightjacketed
Summary: It would seem that a peaceful future is too much to ask when it comes to the Land of Oz, even with Glinda the Good ruling the country... Not quite a crossover, but not set entirely within Wicked's continuity.
1. The Wizard's Fall

A/N: Here's hoping it's a little less messy than my last few attempts... read and review, but above all, enjoy!

* * *

It was a wonderful day for flying.

The sun was soaring high above the mountains, and the clouds simply weren't in the mood to gather; below, the cities and towns and villages of Oz were miniscule things that scarcely looked real from this height- except, of course, for the Emerald City, which glittered magnificently from every single angle it could be seen from. From it, the Yellow Brick Road snaked outwards, a length of yellow twine against the patchwork quilt of the landscape, coiling away into Munchkinland, and… and…

The Wizard's contented smile cracked and fell off his face for the nineteenth time.

He couldn't stop thinking about how it had all gone wrong so quickly: it had started with that apparently inexplicable feeling of depression upon hearing of Elphaba's death. At the time, he'd thought that it hadn't been anything more than simple regret that he hadn't been able to make her see reason; but now the awful truth was clear- she was his daughter and he'd signed her death warrant.

And not just that, either: alone in his balloon, he'd had time to think about Elphaba's life and everything he'd heard of it; he'd heard of how she'd grown up ostracized and bullied because of her appearance; how her mother had died thanks to her father's vain attempt at making sure the next child didn't turn out green; how Elphaba had blamed herself for this and the crippling of her sister…

Just about every tragedy, from birth to death, spiralled back to _him- _beginning with the day he'd sauntered into the Thropp household with a few bottles of Elixir in his coat and an evening of fun on his mind. The sheer scale of it seemed to dwarf everything he'd done in his time on the throne of Oz; but then again, that was easy; all he'd had to do when suppressing animal rights was sit back and say to himself that it was for the good of the public. _This…_ this couldn't be justified, no matter how he looked at it: his own daughter, wronged at every turn of her life by her own father. Her face loomed from his memories, caught forever in an expression of hurt and disillusionment; the words she'd said that day echoed over and over again: "Nobody believed in you more than I did."

At this point, the Wizard would have given anything in the world to stop thinking about her. But the truth was, he couldn't- and he had nothing left to give, anyway. He'd lost his kingdom, he'd lost his authority, he'd lost his machines, and he was on his way back to Nebraska in much the same condition he'd arrived in- admittedly with much more expensive clothes this time. He'd even lost a daughter he'd never known existed…

_Stop thinking about it. Please, just stop._

Machines! Machines were good; he was always good at losing himself in planning out a new machine, a little something for the next audience. And if that didn't dull the pain, there was always the bottle of…

Damn it.

He'd been up here for the better part of an hour, floating sharply east across the Land of Oz, and he still couldn't stop thinking about Elphaba. As he flew across the Deadly Desert, he toyed with the idea of fooling himself into thinking that all his time in Oz had just been a dream- yes, an old, deluded circus magician's dream, the sort you'd conjure up on a warm summer afternoon with nothing to do but sit in your tent, put your feet up and maybe practice throwing your voice. That'd work, wouldn't it? He'd fooled an entire country, hadn't he? What was one foolish old man's belief compared to the beliefs of a whole country?

"Elphaba," said his memory, treacherously, "where I'm from, we believe all sorts of things that aren't true. We call it "history"."

Bastard. Stupid, stupid old bastard.

He couldn't take any more of this. And why should he? It wasn't as if anyone would miss him if he just threw himself out of the balloon right here and now; in Nebraska, he was just another cheap trickster with delusions of stardom; in Oz, he was almost certainly all but forgotten- after all, did anyone remember the old monarchy that came before him? Certainly not! And not now, not with Glinda taking the assumed role of "Shining Beacon of Hope" so seriously. Maybe the Animals would remember him for a while, but undoubtedly as the hated dictator who'd tried to reduce them to mindlessness. As for Dorothy and her friends, they'd remember him. But they'd probably dismissed him as a foolish old humbug by now. That left Madame Morrible, a careerist maniac who was probably doing her very best to get in Glinda's good books- not an ounce of care from her.

So, with nobody to miss him and very little to live for, the Wizard began thinking about death; when would be the right time to end it all? The decision had occurred very quickly; after all, the Wizard had always been very prompt in acting on his impulses, and right now, the impulse to end his life- if it would stop him from thinking about all the waste, all the pointless struggle and all the points in which he could have offered complete amnesty to Elphaba, have surrendered himself to her judgement, possibility after possibility, one wild fantasy after another. He couldn't bear it.

In fact… he was well past the Deadly Desert, now; he couldn't recognize the mountains below, but they looked pretty lethal to him. Beneath those towering peaks, his body would vanish, never to be seen again by the precious few who still thought of him; yes, it sounded more and more promising by the minute. And though there was the issue of pain, something that he'd avoided wherever possible, he doubted it would last longer than a few seconds.

He took a deep breath, and began climbing up the side of the basket; as he took hold of the ropes, he found himself looking down at the landscape unfolding below him, the gargantuan mountains that looked close enough to touch, and found himself curiously exhilarated. Standing here on the very edge of a long drop, with only the balloon's tethering to stop him from falling to his death, he wondered idly if Elphaba had felt this way when she'd first flown from his palace on her broomstick.

_Time to obey gravity_, he thought sadly.

Pausing only to remove his top hat and place it in his left hand, he took a deep breath, closed his eyes and stepped out of the basket. Down he went, plummeting into the air, through the skies and down, down, down…

Apart from the brief lurch in his stomach, the fall was so long it almost became peaceful. In fact, it took so long for him to reach the nearest one of the mountains that he actually had to open his eyes at one point just to see where he was, only to slam them shut in surprise as the jagged peak of the nearest mountain abruptly stabbed upwards towards him. But he missed it, and continued plummeting along the side of the mountain, never once even so much as brushing the rough granite wall.

So it was to be a truly epic fall to the death, all the way to the ground. Somehow, he felt better for it; he'd die quickly, yet spectacularly. Wasn't that just the way he'd wanted to go out when he was a young man, just starting out with his act? Way back then, his death of choice had been pyrotechnic accident- a little too much hydrogen in the flash-bang, a little too much heat, and kaboom! Spectacular death, with an entertained audience to boot! It was such a shame that nobody was here to watch him tumble out of the sky; it would make him feel even better for it, and take his mind off... _her._

As the ground rushed up towards him, the Wizard held his breath: this was it. In a minute or so, it'd all be over; no more guilt, no more memories, only peace. He wondered idly if heaven existed, and then quickly decided that he probably didn't deserve a place in it. Maybe purgatory, if all went well. He could feel time slowing: seconds were becoming minutes; he could see, out of the corner of his eye, his coat rippling and fluttering in the breeze, like wings. Oddly beautiful, but when was he going to hit the ground?

Suddenly, there was a loud rumble, and suddenly, where there had been sharp rocks less than twenty feet below him, there was a massive hole in the earth. The Wizard scarcely had time to utter a yelp of surprise before he fell right through it, the hole vanishing behind him as the rocks slowly crawled back into place. For what felt like an eternity, he tumbled blindly through the darkness; what had been a simple plunge to the hard, unforgiving ground had become an unexpected and unwelcome voyage _into_ the ground, where God only knew what nightmarish monsters lurked, just waiting to enjoy the taste of tender human flesh.

He'd heard stories about the lands beyond Oz, about the things that dwelled there: he'd had a few ambassadors from these lands, almost all of them terrifyingly inhuman, and some of them magical enough to make him worry about his future. What if this lightless cavern wasn't the home of some eyeless, six hundred-legged abomination that could eat the entire population of Oz without needing to swallow, but of an intelligent race? Would that be worse?

Then light flooded the cavern, and the answer occurred to him, for he wasn't falling anymore: he was _floating_ through an chamber of crystalline stalagtites- razor-sharp crystals of every colour of the rainbow, glittering eerily in the dim magical light hovering just above him; words like "enormous" and "colossal" wouldn't do justice to this chamber, for it seemed to go on for miles. For several minutes he floated through the jagged labyrinth, before emerging into what appeared to be a chamber entirely given over to row after row of less gigantic precious stones: diamonds, rubies, garnets, amethysts, sapphires, topazes, lapis lazuli, and... and _emeralds._

As he drifted past the gemstones, the Wizard felt his stomach sinking all the way to his dangling shoes; he couldn't be certain, but something about this place was worryingly familiar- not that he'd ever been here. He'd have remembered a place like this. But perhaps he'd met someone who'd told him about this place, a diplomat, maybe, or even a king. He tried to remember who this person was and what they'd been talking about, to no avail; stress and misery had jumbled his memory.

As he tried to remember, the wall to his left opened, and whatever magical force that had caught him now ushered him inside, depositing him unceremoniously on the hard stone floor. Trembling, he rose to find himself standing in a small room- well, small in that it wasn't much larger than his own audience chamber back in the Emerald City. There was no furniture and no decorations- only craggy black stone walls and black floor tiles like honeycombs; then, with a deafening rumble of rock grinding against rock, the craggy stone wall in front of him moved, rolling upward to reveal another wall, this one smoother, paler, more rounded and with a large, circular carving in its centre.

The new wall swivelled left and right, and for a moment, the Wizard thought it was about to slide away and reveal another wall behind it; instead, the first wall came rolling back over it, and then rolled back into the ceiling. Then, the carving at the centre of the new wall appeared to turn in his direction, and the Wizard realised with horror that he was staring into the dilated pupil of a gigantic stone eyeball, and it had been blinking at him. _Blinking,_ he thought, his mind trying get it's bearings amidst the indescribable, _I'm being blinked at by something the size of a mountain..._

"**TELL ME WHO YOU ARE," **boomed an old and terrible voice from all around him, **"AND WHY YOU HAVE COME ALL THE WAY TO **_**MY**_** KINGDOM, AND WHAT I CAN DO TO MAKE YOU HAPPY."**

Oh God.

He knew who this creature was.

And things had been looking _so_ promising...


	2. An Unexpected Letter

A/N: Tah-daaaaa! Second chapter at last; once again, I hope you enjoy and review, ladies and gents.

* * *

"Well now," said Fiyero, "_This_ is unbelievable."

Elphaba looked up from writing to see her lover holding a crisp white envelope in one burlap hand; for a moment she wasn't quite sure what was so extraordinary about it. Then she noticed the green wax seal- and the very distinctive Z-inside-the-O symbol that had been, for as long as Elphaba could remember, the official emblem of the Ozian government. "Where'd you get that?" she asked, getting to her feet and hurrying over.

"I found it on the front step just a few minutes ago."

"But how did it _get _here, Fiyero? We don't exactly receive mail on a daily basis out here, especially not from anyone back in Oz! Gods almighty, how did they find us?"

"I don't they found "us" at all," said Fiyero absently, as he gently opened the envelope and began pouring over the letter. "It's addressed to me. _To the Honourable Scarecrow, Companion of Dorothy,_ it says here. Doesn't explain how the messenger found us, but at least we know it's probably not a demand for our surrender. And..." There was a deathly pause as the Scarecrow's eyes widened. "Oh damn," he said quietly. "Uh, Elphaba, you'd better hear this."

"What's wrong? What does it say?"

"_To the Honourable Scarecrow, Companion of Dorothy,"_ Fiyero recited. _"I have no doubt that you needed solitudity to put your new brains to use, and I must apologise for disturbing you; however, I find myself in desperate need of assistance- specifically from one of Dorothy's legendary companions. Despite my best efforts to keep the people united, I have been beset by political unrest: numerous Anti-Animal groups have opposified me for daring to support Animal Rights, while others suspect my motives simply for my past associations with the Wicked Witch of the West. If you recall your last visit to the Emerald City, you would remember the warm reception you received, and how so very many citizens suggested making you king; I wouldn't dare to impose such a burden on you without your permission, but for the time being, I must humbly request your presence in the Emerald City as soon as possible. It may be that I may only require your public support to calm the less agreeable elements of my constituency, but that remains to be seen. Sincerely, Glinda the Good."_

There was a very long silence.

"At least we know how the letter reached us," said Elphaba quietly, latching onto the first certainty within reach.

"We do?"

"Of course; Glinda has the Grimmerie, remember? She's had at least a year to try and decipher it, and tracking spells aren't too difficult to master, so long as you've got a sample of the target's hair, skin or blood."

"Or straw," grumbled Fiyero bitterly. "I _knew_ I should've gotten that rip in my back fixed before that last visit- I must have left behind a few bits of straw in the throne room. Oh well, I suppose it's not all bad."

"True, true," Elphaba admitted. In spite of her shock, she was pleased to hear from Glinda, even if the letter technically wasn't for her; and for all the difficulties the letter mentioned, the politics and power-plays, it was good to know that her old friend really was living up to her title. Perhaps, with her in power, Oz might actually have a chance at a prosperous future- one _not_ founded upon trickery and suppression. A faint echo of the hatred she'd felt for the Wizard echoed through her, before being hastily buried; after all, what was the point in getting angry at someone who had been well and truly ousted from power well over a year ago? Instead, she began thinking about Glinda again:

What was it like in Glinda's court, right now? Was she sitting alone at a desk, bent over papers and treaties and official statements and other paperwork? Was she mingling with her people, offering reassuring smiles and heartfelt promises that all would be well? Was she trying to practice magic, with the Grimmerie and so many other mysterious works on magic and _of_ magic strewn around her?

"What are you thinking of doing?" she asked.

"I'm honestly not sure. I mean, I'm all in favour of helping her, but what happens if I really do end up as the King of Oz? What would happen to you?"

Elphaba offered a wicked grin. "Whoever said I'd have to stay here while you rule the kingdom? If you _do_ become king, servants aren't going to ask questions about why his Royal Highness wants the highest of the tower suites put under a permanent Do Not Disturb notice."

"I've gotta admit," laughed Fiyero, "I like that idea. So, you'd get a letter from me and fly in under the cover of darkness, that sort of thing?"

"Something like that, your Highness."

"Har har. Well, hopefully, I won't have to become king- I'll just be the political support: they'll just ask me to make an appearance at some parade, wave, shake a few hands and go home; Glinda will get all the support she'll ever need, and the anti-Animal groups can scuttle off under the rocks they've been living under since the Wizard left. No loose ends, everybody's happy. And if not..."

"... There's always the Do Not Disturb notice," finished Elphaba. The grin on her face could not have been removed without the aid of a hammer and chisel.

"So you're fine with me leaving?"

"Of course. We've got all eventualities covered, haven't we? Come on, let's start preparing..."

* * *

"Will you be needing that diploma?"

"Oh, might as well; she'll expect that I'll still need proof of my brains. Let's also have those history books from the top shelf- I might as well have something to read..."

Sometime after acquiring the house, Elphaba had decided that, even without the Grimmerie, she could still put her powers to good use: so, she'd set up a modest laboratory in one of the largest rooms in the building for experimenting with certain forms of magic, and spent weeks gathering or assembling quite a few important items to that end: a set of alchemical equipment (alembic, crucible, beakers, scales, mortar and pestle, and so on); a number of spellbooks (all Ozian and nowhere near as potent as the Grimmerie, unfortunately) and other tomes on magic; a practice dummy (made of wood- Fiyero got very panicky when he witnessed _straw_ dummies being abused); a collection of elemental conductors and batteries; a replacement broomstick (she'd taken great pains to memorize the levitation spell); a jar of sand from the Deadly Desert; and of course, her crystal ball, taken from Kiamo Ko.

They were here now, gearing the intrepid strawman ("Please don't call me that," he'd muttered despairingly) for the long journey that lay ahead: being virtually immortal, he didn't need much in the way of protection, but the sands of the Deadly Desert could still dissolve the burlap and straw that had replaced his flesh and blood. So, after their hurried flight across the border, Elphaba had decided that the broomstick would be a much too noticeable form of transport if they ever needed to return to Oz, and after much experimentation, had created two amulets that provided more than enough protection from the sands. They also allowed the wearer to walk on water, but that usually resulted in considerable embarrassment (and wet shoes).

There was more than that to prepare for, though... and much more to think about. She was already missing Fiyero even though he was standing right beside her; it seemed silly in light of everything that could actually go _right_ for once, but that didn't stop the little concerns from creeping up on her. After all, they'd managed to build a stable if isolated life for themselves out here in the wilderness beyond Oz, and any disruptions to it were bound to cause massive tremors.

In the year they'd spent outside of Oz, they'd been content for the most part; quite apart from the intricacies of magic and the pleasure of Fiyero's company, Elphaba was happy that with her lover's help, she'd finally managed to escape her old miseries. It had been a rough start, though: at the time, Fiyero still walked with his staggering, boneless gait; sometimes he toppled over on the rocky, uneven ground and needed to be helped up- or worse, sewn up. Elphaba kept having nightmares: sometimes they were about their escape from Oz, in which, instead of sailing gently over the sands on the oak branch, they fell to their deaths in the shifting dunes; other times, she was being chased through the corridors of the Wizard's palace by a cackling, spider-legged duplicate of herself, until a giant mechanical hand descended from the sky and flattened them like bugs.

And then there had been the difficulties just staying alive- finding food, keeping hostile creatures away from the house, and so on. A few magical fireballs initially kept the hungry wolves at bay, but it wasn't until they'd ripped off Fiyero's arm that the wolf packs decided that the newcomers simply weren't appetising enough. Eventually, after living off wolf-meat and berries for a week and a half, a small town had been located scarcely a few miles from the house, and though the locals were quite surprised by the unexpected visitors, they gradually accepted them, just as the two of them came to accept the town. Fiyero in particular enjoyed the chance to mingle, even if people were constantly staring at him: there was always the occasional gang of children daring each other to "ask the green lady and the straw man where they comes from," and the odd clerk at the general store getting nosy, but that was about the limit of difficulties.

And so they'd carried on in peace for the past year. Unfortunately, the letter had changed all that: the old guilt had returned with a vengeance, and the words "_others suspect my motives simply for my past associations with the Wicked Witch of the West" _had only made it sting even worse.

Of course, guilt had been her default emotion by the time she'd left Oz: guilt that she'd failed to save Nessarose, guilt that she hadn't been able to do more for Boq, guilt that she'd failed to save Fiyero (or so she'd thought)... there had also been a considerable amount of rage, as well- usually neatly intertwined with the exact same events that instilled guilt in her. On and on it went, building up to that spectacular breakdown where she'd refused to sleep for almost a week and hurled just about every form of magic she'd learned across the countryside in a maelstrom of chaos and destruction.

It had taken that long year to finally put it all to rest, and she wasn't prepared to see it all come crashing back down on top of her just because of a few malcontents who actually missed being lied to by the Wizard. She was going to see the best of this: Glinda would have the assistance that she deserved, and Fiyero would be allowed the company that they so often lacked out in the wastes.

There was only one other thing that bothered her, as she carefully tightened the amulet around his neck, one thing that had escaped her self-reassurances...

Back when she'd been interested in espionage, she'd tried to use the crystal ball to spy on the Wizard; to her disappointment, all she'd received was static. At first, she thought that the crystal hadn't been properly attuned to the ether; when she'd later managed a very clear picture of Dorothy Gale and her companions, she decided it must have something to do with Madam Morrible. Weather magic was the press secretary's speciality, but gods only knew how many enchantments the old bitch had up her sleeve to keep the Wizard's illusion of power in place. Or perhaps it had been the work of other witches or magicians that the Wizard had employed; maybe it hadn't even been the work of the Wizard at all, but the mysterious rulers that had come before him and whatever eldritch mages they'd had among their retinues.

Whatever the case, unfortunately, this meant that she'd have no idea what how things had gone for Fiyero until a message arrived back. Nor did she have any idea how Glinda was faring, what had been done with Madame Morrible, what Boq and the Cowardly Lion had done with their lives, and even the political situation in the Emerald City. Maybe, if Fiyero _was_ crowned the king of Oz, there would be the chance to unravel some of the more troubling secrets, to ensure that her lover never had to fall onto jagged rocks and shred every stitch in his body again... and to see- albeit clandestinely- that her old friend was still alive and well.

So it was with growing hope for the future that she found herself shepherding Fiyero down the garden path and towards the desert with a warm farewell.

* * *

As the Scarecrow goose-stepped towards the outskirts of the Deadly Desert, a solitary stone eyeball watched him from the soil; then, blinking ponderously, it focussed on the green-skinned woman as she walked slowly back through the garden and into the house. Its original mission had been to spy on the newly-located Scarecrow, but suddenly, new orders were pouring into its stone brain- orders to watch the figure that had bid the original target farewell. The eyeball wasn't troubled by this change of plans; after all, there were another few million eyes from here to the Emerald City left to watch the Scarecrow.


	3. Journey of the Kings

A/N: Well, it's third chapter time, and it won't be long before fourth chapter and the grand reveal of the story's villain- unless of course, you've already guessed. Read and review, and above all, enjoy!

* * *

The Deadly Desert lay before him, stretching onwards in mile after mile of lethal sand dunes, each grain containing enough malignant energy to dissolve anything bearing the slightest resemblance to living tissues- and that included Fiyero's burlap skin. This place wasn't natural: anybody who'd seen the long grass and lush forest that ended at its borders could see that. Astonishingly enough, once upon a time, this place had been nothing more than a pouchful of enchanted dust lying at the bottom of a ditch; some ancient spell prevented it from being carried very far beyond its resting place by wind or rain, so for years, it subsisted on brigands and travellers, until it grew enough to fill the ditch.

Then a war broke out between Oz and some long-forgotten country, and troops from either side had charged across the countryside where the sands had been discarded time and time again, each charge bringing them across the sands, each charge growing shorter and less enthusiastic as the dunes grew larger with every regiment they consumed. It took some time, but eventually, the soldiers learned:

Anything living that touched the sand turned _into_ sand.

More precisely, anything possessed of a soul that came in contact with the sand disintegrated, taking on the same curse that surrounded the rest of the desert. Once the transformation had begun, it took less than a second for the victim to collapse into a new dune, and no magic in the world could possibly reverse it. And sometimes, so the legends said, if you looked carefully enough on windy days, you could see ghosts take shape in the shifting sands, reaching arms and grasping hands, sometimes even a face- permanently frozen in one last agonised scream.

Fiyero shuddered, and felt for the amulet around his neck, just to remind himself that it was still there, still preventing his body from dissolving. He really shouldn't have started thinking about the old legends, but with the sands of the desert all around him, what could he possibly do?

At present, he was sitting on the rusted base of an enormous steel column half-buried in the sand, reading one of the enormous tomes on history he'd borrowed from Elphaba; it took his mind off the endless concern that the amulet might somehow fail, but then again, the column he was leaning against was doing enough distraction on its own. After all, this was rusty spire was one of at least fifteen leading off into the distance- for all intents and purposes, the path that would lead him back into Oz- and it had quite a history of its own.

This had once been an elevated tramway, starting at the lower reaches of Oz's northern outskirts and leading across the Deadly Desert and into the northeastern Kingdom of Ev; they'd called it the Desert Ferry, and it had been one of the Wizard's most ambitious construction projects- and by far the most dangerous. Once completed, it had enjoyed a heyday, for at the time, Ev had still retained an interest in the Land of Oz, so their royal family could be transported across the desert in luxurious tramcars suspended hundreds of feet above the lethal sands. Slowly, the Desert Ferry grew in fame, accumulating titles like "The Pride of Oz," and "The King of the Sands," and for a while, there was talk of making expanding the tramway so that it began in the Emerald City, and adding secondary lines that would allow it passage to other countries beyond Oz.

And then of course, one of the Wizard's ambassadors was sent into Ev- on the exact same day that the tramcar's windows happened to accidentally open halfway through the journey; nobody saw what happened _inside_ the car, but guards positioned at the far ends of the tramway could see the freak sandstorm that had sprung up around it. There were no bodies to bury that day, only heaps of sand that collected on the seats and in odd corners of the tram. Quite naturally, the Ozian nobility had accused Ev of sabotaging the car, and spent the next few weeks howling for their blood until the Wizard put a stop to any potential invasions by ordering the tramway cables cut and the cars permanently dismantled. Now, all that was left of the Desert Ferry were the support columns that Fiyero now leaned against, reading his books.

It still seemed strange how quickly he'd taken to reading; back in Shiz, he couldn't have cared less about these books, and most of his career as captain of the Wizard's personal guard had been occupied with trying to find Elphaba. But once he and Elphaba had made their escape across the border- and after the first few weeks they'd spent just trying to stay alive- there honestly wasn't that much to do; so, against all expectation, Fiyero had asked if he could borrow one of Elphaba's books. She'd been surprised at the request, but pleased that he was taking an interest in one of her favourite subjects- always a plus in Fiyero's books.

And so it was that Fiyero found that once he'd started reading, he simply couldn't put the book down. He couldn't tell if this was because the book was more interesting than the ones he'd tossed aside back in school, or if he'd matured enough to appreciate the content, but whatever the case, he'd changed. He certainly couldn't take up his old lifestyle of carefree hedonism, not as the clumsy scarecrow he'd become, unable to eat or drink (though he could still sleep if he tried hard enough). So, he found himself not only reading more, but acting as Elphaba's assistant during some of the more strenuous experiments- and surprised both his lover and himself by learning about chemistry.

Elphaba had thanked him time and again for the help he'd given, but to be honest, he didn't need her thanks- he was happy enough just being with her, making her happy. Besides, she'd saved his life, a point in his life that his dreams would never let him forget, for on those nights when he concentrated hard enough to sleep, he always dreamt back to the cornfield.

He always remembered the feel of the splintery wooden poles under his arms, the baking heat of the sun on his heat, and above all, the thudding pain as the angry guardsmen beat him again and again. He always remembered the pain, the fear, and the vague sense of triumph at the fact that they still hadn't made him confess, even as they broke his other leg. And then he'd felt the magic spiralling through the air, washing across his body, permeating and altering it; from somewhere beyond the normal realms of sound, he heard a voice chanting in an incomprehensible language. And then, as the chanting faded away, the pain went with it, and Fiyero had opened his eyes to see the Wizard's guardsmen fleeing in terror.

He smiled to himself. How things had changed in his life! From hedonist, to guardsman, to captain, to traitor, to scarecrow... and now to king! Uttering a contented sigh, he returned to his reading; after all, he still had quite a distance to walk, and no idea when he'd next get a chance to stop and read.

An hour later, Fiyero stood and stretched- purely out of habit-, put his books back inside his satchel, and continued onward through the desert, following the trail of the old tramway.

* * *

Not too far away, a stone eyeball watched him thoughtfully; it waited until he was in the process of vanishing over the next dune, and then closed its lid. Several hundred metres away, another stone eye appeared in a boulder not too far from the Scarecrow's position.

The watchers weren't afraid of the Deadly Desert.

Fear wasn't something that came easily to the soulless.

* * *

Hours later, trees began to appear on the horizon, and Fiyero knew that he was on the right path back into Oz; for a time, he enjoyed the sight of the verdant countryside unfolding around him, before heading south towards the nearest village. It was several miles away, but Fiyero didn't mind all that much; after all, he was incapable of feeling even the most basic pains in his feet.

The villagers were quite surprised to be visited by one of Dorothy's legendary companions, and treated him to just about every luxury they could possibly offer; Fiyero politely accepted a few of them- directions being the most prominent of them- before taking his leave. Then it was back to walking across the countryside, sometimes walking along the gravel paths, sometimes taking shortcuts through cornfields (the exquisite irony of this wasn't lost on him), until at last, he arrived in the upper reaches of Munchkinland. From there, he was very careful not to delay any further: he bypassed just about every single one of the villages and towns he came upon, doing his very best to avoid contact with his adoring fans- for as much as he enjoyed their attentions, it slowed his pace. And he didn't want to keep an old friend waiting.

How much had Glinda changed since he'd last seen her?

She'd already dropped a good deal of her old superficiality during their last meeting in the Emerald City, but what else had changed about her? Did she rule over Oz with the same brand of glib charm that she'd used while working for the Wizard, or was her rule more sober? Did she mingle among the nobles and politicians, as she did in the old days, or did she spend her days alone amidst paperwork?

The questions nagged at him, fuelling his stride as he marched awkwardly out of the underbrush and onto the Yellow Brick Road. From here, it was a straightforward walk towards the Emerald City, as far away as it might seem; thankfully, there weren't too many people travelling on the road that day, so Fiyero managed to avoid slowing down too much. He didn't know how long he'd been walking just to get this far, and frankly, he didn't care. All that mattered was arriving at his destination.

Before long, the Emerald City glittered magnificently before him, its towers and turrets soaring ever-upwards towards the sky as he drew closer to it. Taking this familiar route towards the city gates was like meeting an old friend: he'd lived in this city for a time after his so-called graduation, and it had satisfied his baser desires for wine, women and revelry- along with an endless supply of tailored suits. He'd joined the Wizard's personal guard, too, partly so that he could enjoy the benefits of a splendid uniform and the respect of the citizens, but most because it would allow him to meet Elphaba again. Ah yes, in the end, it had been all about finding her. None of his old distractions could quite bury his growing attraction, not even his ascent through the ranks; if anything, it made him more determined to find her, more determined to keep her out of the Wizard's clutches. By the time he'd reached the rank of captain, he wasn't even a shadow of the workshy lout that had arrived at Shiz University so long ago.

Fiyero took a deep breath he didn't really need anymore; he could hear the crowds even from here, hear the marching feet of the guards as they took their positions at the gate. They'd seen the familiar figure staggering up the Yellow Brick Road, and they wanted to give him a welcome worthy of one of Dorothy's Companions.

And so it began...

* * *

Several hundred miles away, a voice rang out in the stygian darkness of the mountain caverns: it was a harsh, unpleasant voice, vaguely reminiscent of someone dragging a file across a stone. Had anyone been watching the events going on in these tunnels, they would have been able to make out- if only by the pale light of phosphorous rocks- the roughly-carved face of the speaker protruding from the wall. "Your Majesty!" the voice hissed. "The Scarecrow has arrived in the Emerald City at last."

There was the sound of grinding rock from the shadows, as the occupant of the cave stirred from its slumber; eventually, a voice boomed, **"VERY GOOD. IS GLINDA STILL WITHIN THE PALACE WALLS?"**

"Yes, Your Majesty; though we cannot hear her voice within the earth, we see her from afar. She often sits upon the windowsill of the topmost tower of the palace."

"**AND WHAT OF THE WITCH? HAS SHE YET MOVED FROM HER POSITION?"**

"No, Your Majesty; at present, she is still busying herself with her magics and potions. Do you wish her taken, Your Majesty? We could easily burrow through the floorboards, if that is your wish."

"**NO. AN ATTEMPT AT KIDNAPPING WOULD ACCOMPLISH NOTHING- LEAST OF ALL HER CAPTURE. REST ASSURED, WHEN THE TIME IS RIGHT, SHE WILL COME TO US. HAVE YOUR SPY CONTINUE WATCHING HER FOR THE MOMENT, AND ENSURE IT KEEPS ME INFORMED OF ANY DEVELOPMENTS. THEN CONTACT MOMBI AND INFORM HER THAT HER FORCES WILL SOON BE NEEDED."**

"It will be done, Your Majesty."

For a moment, there was silence as the messenger's face disappeared from the wall; then there was a contented sigh that sounded like molten lava oozing down the slopes of a volcano. **"AT LONG LAST," **purred the voice. **"EVERYTHING IS FALLING INTO PLACE…"**

* * *

"This way, please, sir," murmured the Captain of the Guard.

The city hadn't changed much; the people were still dressed in the height of fashion, the streets were still gleaming with cleanliness, and the emerald-studded walls of the city still glittered enchantingly in the sunshine. In fact, the only thing that had changed was the advertising: the orderly rows of posters for "_Wizomania"_ and "_A Celebration Of The Great Oz"_ had been replaced by layer after layer of posters for "_Glinda the Good- Bringing Hope To The Hopeless." _It wasn't until Fiyero got past the improvised parade that the screaming crowds had thrown for him that he saw a new kind of poster arriving on the scene; to his shock, it read, "_Let The Man With The Brains Take The Crown: Scarecrow For King._"

Thankfully, they'd arrived at the palace before any more nasty shocks had arrived; here, little had changed either. True, there were a few obvious changes to the place: for a start, there were less cringing servants and more bureaucrats this time, and most of the guards had replaced their halberds with crossbows and sabres; also, to Fiyero's delight, it seemed that there were Animals employed here, and if the clothes were any evidence, some of them had risen quite high in their fields. _And of course,_ he thought, dodging a harried-looking Munchkin secretary and two neatly-dressed Otter lawyers, _the place is a lot busier than ever before._

"We're in the middle of a rather busy period right now," the captain droned. "It's all this rush to make a king out of you, y'see. I think they're bringing out every single bigwig with the slightest bit of sway just to let 'em get up on the podium and say how great you'll be for Oz."

_So much for just attending the odd parade, _Fiyero thought bemusedly. _At least we planned for this... sort of. _Out loud, he asked, "You really think I'm going to be crowned king?"

"Oh, of course; Glinda's been brilliant at running the country, but none of them bastards in the Anti-Animal League are going to listen to a word she says; and then there's all the daft buggers who think that she and the Wicked Witch o' the West were friends." The captain scoffed contemptuously; if he hadn't been walking through the corridors of the most lavish building in the country, he'd probably have spat against the wall, too.

"And none of them have anything to say about me?"

"Course not, sir! You're a hero. Besides, you're a scarecrow, sir- nobody's gonna talk about how _you_ and the Witch were old school chums."

Fiyero hastily submerged his laughter, and continued down the hallway. "You said they were bringing in a lot of bigwigs," he added hurriedly. "Any of them I'd know? Bear in mind that I've been living in the wilderness for the last year."

"Well, apart from the usual lot of governors and such, they're also calling on the Lion and the Tin Man- not as hard as it sounds, mind you, because they've all had business about the Emerald City for last few months."

"All the old companions are here, then?"

"That's right, sir. Matter of fact, we'd probably bring in Dorothy Gale herself if we could find her. Now, if you'd just follow me through here sir- shortcut, y'see…"

They made a sharp turn to the left, through an archway, and out into a courtyard; Fiyero recognized it almost instantly as one of the official training grounds for the guardsmen. At this time, it was almost empty except for the training dummies (straw and sacking, he noted with a shudder), the old obstacle course, and two figures currently engaged in what looked like an extremely lethargic sparring session- one figure holding a distinctive axe, the other holding a halberd.

The first of the two was instantly recognizable as the Tin Man, AKA Boq, who hadn't changed all that much in the last year. The second was…

Well, it looked rather like a copper cauldron on legs.

More specifically, it was four feet tall, with an almost spherical body of burnished copper, two thick pillar-like legs, two spindly little arms, and an equally spherical head perched atop the whole grotesque ensemble. As Fiyero drew closer, he saw that the thing had what could loosely be described as a face: though it had no mouth as such, it _did_ have a handlebar moustache and two enormous turquoise eyes of glass. The moment it saw the two of them strolling across the courtyard, it immediately snapped to attention and saluted with a loud _clank_ of metal on metal.

"Mister-Scarecrow-Sir!" it said; the thing's voice was an even monotone, and sounded as though it was coming from somewhere around its stomach. "Very-Pleased-To-Meet-The-Future-King-Of-Oz,-Sir!"

"At ease, Tik-Tok," said the Boq. "Pleased to see you too, Scarecrow. How are you?"

Fiyero offered a welcoming smile; they'd been friendly enough back when they'd been in the company of Dorothy Gale, even through the Tin Man's brief and unsavoury career rallying the Witch-Hunters. Maybe it was the conversations they'd had on the road- the old debates on wether brain or heart was better. Then of course, Elphaba had admitted that his on-and-off friend was also the obsessive nerd that had been stalking Glinda back in Shiz, and Fiyero's head had almost dropped off in amazement.

"Oh, you know," he answered cheerily, "still keeping myself as well-stitched as possible. What about you? Have you gotten yourself nickel-plated yet?"

"Not yet, no; been too busy."

"Why? What have you been up to?"

"Oh, I've been organising security for Her Highness Glinda. It's been so terrible in the last few months, what with all these riots and protests by the Anti-Animal Leagues, so I thought it would be best if I offered my support."

_You're still hoping to catch her eye, aren't you?_

"And does she appreciate it?"

"Oh of course, of course!" Boq exclaimed, his tin expression ever-so-slightly manic.

_You poor bastard._

Fiyero tried not to look too sceptical, and asked, "So you're helping out with security? I take it that this thing here's helping as well- actually, what _is_ this thing?"

The copper cauldron creature saluted again. "Allow-Me-To-Introduce-Myself,-Your-Future-Highness: I-Am-Tik-Tok, The-Royal-Army-Of-Oz."

"_Army?"_ echoed Fiyero.

Boq offered a somewhat sheepish laugh. "That's the funny thing about Oz; apart from the Emerald Guard and all the other local security forces, the country hasn't had a proper army in years. From what little we've learned, Tik-Tok here was one of the Wizard's creations- supposed to be the first of an army of clockwork soldiers; trouble is, the court artisans never got around to mass-producing the design before he left. As a matter of fact, we didn't even know Tik-Tok existed until about four months ago, while we were clearing out some of the old vaults."

"He stayed down there for six months and didn't even call for help? Why?"

Tik-Tok turned around with a cacophonous thudding to display three clockwork handles set into his rounded back; they were labelled "Speech," "Thought," and "Action." Fiyero processed this information as quickly as he could, and eventually asked, "So his clockwork wound down, is that right?"

"Exactly, Your-Future-Highness. But-Now-That-I-Am-Out-Of-Storage, I-Am-Now-Serving-To-The-Best-Of-My-Abilities, As-Will-My-Fellow-Units-When-The-Court-Artisans-Begin-Production." He saluted again.

_Well, you're short, you're clumsy, your arms are __**tiny**__, and if your thought or action runs down, you're totally defenceless. The future of Oz is in small but capable hands, ladies and gentlemen. And if you could please stop calling me "Your Future Highness," I might be less inclined to have you sent to the scrap yard when I actually become king._

"Well," said Fiyero, trying not to laugh despairingly, "I'm very glad to see that we're well on the way to having a reliable and incorruptible military, Mr Tik-Tok. Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got an appointment with Miss Glinda."

"I-Understand, Your-Future-Highness. Shall-We-Continue-With-Sparring, Mr-Tin-Man?"

* * *

After many twists and turns, they finally arrived at the double doors that marked the entrance to the palace's throne room; as those doors swung open, Fiyero became aware of another change that had occurred in the palace: where once the throne room had been filled with the deafening boom of the Wizard's amplified voice and the whirring of complicated machinery, there was now a deep silence, broken only by the faint rustling of paper. The silence up here was palpable- it layered every single inch of the enormous room, absorbing the sound of their footsteps like thick carpet. In fact, the quiet of the throne room was so startling that it took a while for Fiyero to notice Glinda.

She was sitting quietly at her desk, sorting through a small mound of paperwork in front of her. By the looks of things, she'd been working for a very long time; quite apart from her pallid complexion, tangled hair, and the dark rings around her eyes, her face had acquired that look of weary determination common to tired bureaucrats everywhere. "I can make it," the expression read, "I can make it. Just a few more forms, then I can go home and sleep. Just a few more forms."

Eventually, she looked up to see Fiyero and the captain of the guard standing in the doorway; her eyes lit up, and she exclaimed, "Mr Scarecrow! I'm so sorry- I didn't hear you come in. Do sit down, please!" She waved a hand in the general direction of the marble floor in front of the desk, and a plush armchair slowly materialised in the indicated spot. As the captain left the room, Fiyero eased himself into the chair, and asked, "How have you been, Miss Glinda?"

"Bearing up," sighed Glinda. "There has been a _lot_ of work to get through in the past year; but believe me, it's all worthwhile. Well, apart from the sleeping problems, but I've got potions for that."

"At least someone else will be doing the all the administrative work from now on," Fiyero joked idly.

Glinda looked blank for a moment. "Ah," she said at last, "You've seen those posters, then?"

"And heard the gossip, too; I think about half of the Emerald City wants me to become king- even the royal army's calling me "Your Future Highness". Not bad for someone who couldn't keep the birds off the crops, eh?"

"Oh, I can think of hundreds of people who've risen above their own disadvantages: the Tin Man, the Lion, you, and-" Glinda's expression flickered; Fiyero didn't need to be told what it meant. Then, as if by magic, the smile was back on her face. "Well, you get the idea. But as for the administration, I'm sure you won't have to actually do too much of the paperwork- we have servants for that. All you need to do is make the decisions, sign the forms, meet the diplomats- you get the idea. How does that sound?"

Fiyero shrugged. "Fine by me. How long until the official coronation?"

Now it was Glinda's turn to shrug. "I don't know. Does an hour and half sound okay?"

"I'm sorry, _what?"_

She offered an apologetic smile. "I told you in my letter that there are groups opposifying my administration. What I didn't mention was that there was never any question of you becoming king: the moment I suggested you as a replacement, they agreed on the condition that you took power the moment you arrived in the city, just so I wouldn't have the opportunity to interfere. They're fine with me acting as an official Defender of the realm, and that's it. So, as of half an hour ago, you are the King of Oz."

_Damn it._

"And... you're not troubled by this?" Fiyero asked. He couldn't think of anything else to say.

Glinda sighed. "At this point, Mr Scarecrow," she said wearily, "I'm too tired to be troubled; I've never been attracted to power- popularity maybe, but certainly not power- and I'm not upset that I have to step down. And don't forget," she added brightly, "it was me who suggested you as a replacement; I knew you were supportive of Animal rights, I knew you were responsible enough for leadership... and you were the only one I knew of with the brains for the job."

And in spite of themselves, they laughed.

* * *

Three hours later, the scraping voice of the messenger sounded yet again- this time aboveground. By this time, it was late afternoon, and the sky above Munchkinland had turned a fiery orange, bathing the conspirators in an appropriately hellish glow as they turned to face the visitor.

"**I take it that the Scarecrow has finally been crowned?" **one of them uttered. Some time ago, this voice had been much louder, but with mortal ears so close by, it had lowered itself sufficiently enough to avoid any unwanted interruptions.

"Yes, Your Majesty!" cackled the messenger. "The entire city is in celebration, and messages of the coronation are being sent to the other cities and towns of Oz."

"**Very good indeed. Where is his highness at present?"**

"My spy in the area reported him standing at the topmost window of the palace's tallest tower, your majesty; Glinda is with him at present."

"Of course she's with him, the loathsome little trollop," spat another voice. Unlike the other two, this voice was that of a human woman, and it bubbled with venom. "Probably trying to curry favour with the strawman the only way she knows how."

"**Somehow, I doubt that very much, Mombi." **There was a soft grinding of rock, as the voice's attention returned to the messenger. **"Return to the rallying grounds, and give the order to begin the march. I will join them shortly."**

"As you command, Your Majesty," said the messenger. "Have you any specific orders for the advance teams?"

"**Yes: have them attack the palace's foundations- the tallest tower, for choice."**

"It will be done, Your Majesty."

"**As for you, Mombi," **said the first of the conspirators as their messenger burrowed back into the earth, **"You will return to **_**your**_** forces and lead their charge into the city; we should have arrived by that time. I am counting on you to ensure the death of anyone who might have escaped the effects of my spell- with the exception of the Scarecrow, of course."**

"And you will uphold your end of the bargain?"

"**Provided you uphold yours. Now run along, my dear: the Wheelers must be growing restless..."**

* * *

"... and then of course, there's the Last Resort Protocols," the secretary droned.

"And what do they entail exactly?" asked Fiyero, suspecting he'd regret it.

"Well, Your Highness, the Last Resort Protocols are to be used on any occasions in which find ourselves facing a crisis that our military is unable to combat, and have no way of summoning our traditional allies. This entails contacting potential allies from beyond our world by means of a quick and easily ritual of teleportation, performed upon a letter of urgency or similar item. Now, this ritual can be performed even by those with little experience, skill or natural talent with magic, and it pr-"

"Hold on a minute!" Fiyero interrupted. "Exactly what allies are we supposed to contact?"

"Oh, there are so many. The protocols specify anyone who might have helped Oz in the past: Dorothy Gale, for example, or even the Wizard himself. Now, your majesty, this ritual proceeds as follows: place the item you wish to teleport on the ground in front of you, draw a circle in blood (not your own, of course), and recite the words _Calexemephrabis Revemexpi Ardunagux Kai Trobuxis _until the item disappears. Now, if Your Highness would repeat after me..."

Fiyero had been king for hours now, and he certainly didn't feel any more powerful than he had before- not with this idiot drooling on about court protocol. In fact, the only bit of influence he'd had over the man was in deciding where they could hold this discussion- in the uppermost room of tallest tower of the palace; he'd intended to use this as a chance to see if the room could be used as a hideaway for Elphaba, but as the evening wore on, it looked as though he'd be using it as a chance to hurl the secretary out the window.

"Kettleborough," said Glinda, as Fiyero finally managed to repeat the words of the ritual off by heart, "Don't you think that's enough?"

"Not to worry, Miss Glinda- we'll be finished in a minute or two. If you'd just care to sign these, your majesty..."

Pausing only to scan the papers for anything remotely connected with Anti-Animal Rights groups or other objectionable content, Fiyero then scrawled his signature; the sound of fireworks and cheering in the distance helped numb the boredom as he wrote. Finally, with all twelve of the papers signed, he handed them to Kettleborough, who bowed and scurried away.

It was then that he sat back against the cushions of the bed, and surveyed the room: at first glance, it looked quite standard for a guest room of the palace- four-poster bed, thick rugs on the floor, soothing oil paintings on the wall, and a fine rosewood vanity in the corner. However, as Fiyero's gaze swept across the room a second time, he realised that something was ever-so-slightly different. It took him a while to isolate it: a faint, musty odour that no amount of perfume could mask, a smell redolent of abandoned lofts and garrets...

"Was this once an attic?" he asked innocently.

"Yes," said Glinda, surprised. "I had it remade as a bedroom for my private use."

"Why's that?" asked Fiyero.

"Oh... memories."

Ah. So _this_ had been the attic where Elphaba had first taken flight on her broomstick. Back when he'd been little more than a corporal in the guard, Glinda had told him about this place, of how she'd watched in amazement as Elphaba had floated into the air towards the open skylight, sending horrified guardsmen scurrying for cover as she went. But of course, Fiyero had to keep up his disuise; so, he let his face go blank with confusion.

There was a pause; eventually, Glinda said, "I'd like to show you something, Mr Scarecrow- something I've never shown anyone before. Even the servants haven't seen this," she added, as she guided him across the room, towards the vanity. She paused, appearing to gather herself, and then waved her hand in a complicated gesture: as she did so, the vanity slowly blurred and faded into thin air, leaving behind a small pedestal of finely-carved white marble. Above this pedestal hovered the spectral image of a woman; Fiyero didn't even need to look closely to recognize her as Elphaba- younger, shyer, and hiding behind her long hair, but undoubtedly Elphaba. The image had obviously been taken not too long after the dance at the Ozdust Ballroom, because she was still wearing the black dress she'd worn that night.

Below the image, silver letters hung in midair: **IN LOVING MEMORY OF ELPHABA THROPP.**

And below them: "Some are born wicked; others have wickedness thrust upon them."

Fiyero remembered his disguise just in time. "Is that-?"

"Yes. I wanted to have a picture of her when she was at her happiest- so I took it from my memory."

"So..." _Think, Fiyero, think! Don't blow your cover now!_ "You really _were_ friends."

"Once upon a time, we were the best of friends; back in university, I was the only friend she had. And sometimes, just sometimes, I think she deserved so much better. She wasn't always as bad as she was towards the end, you know: even when the press started calling her a Wicked Witch, she still cared about people; she still thought she could change Oz for the better. But after her sister died, and after F... she just..." Glinda swallowed. "It wasn't her fault," she said shakily.

"What do you mean? Whose fault was it?"

Glinda tried to speak slowly, but she'd been waiting too long to discuss this with another living being for coherency to play any part in her speech. "I could blame just about everyone in Oz who wronged her in her life... but in the end... it was my fault. If I hadn't told them about her sister, if I hadn't been so selfish, if I had gone with her when she flew for the first time _I might have been able to help her against the wizard and she wouldn't have gone mad and we'd still be friends and she'd still be alive but she isn't she's dead and it's all my fault!"_

There was silence, broken only by the astoundingly quiet sound of Glinda crying. Eventually, Fiyero put an arm around her; it probably didn't help much, considering that, as far as Glinda knew, the Scarecrow had hated the Wicked Witch of the West just as much as any citizen of Oz, but he couldn't just leave her in tears. Eventually, she calmed enough to say, "I was there when she died, you know. She was just so... _calm_, too; she took the bucket of water into the room with her. She _wanted_ to die by then. And all I could do was watch."

For a moment, neither of them spoke. And then, under the influence of surprise, guilt, and a dozen other accumulated emotions from the long day, Fiyero made one of the worst mistakes he could have possibly made: he opened his mouth, and said, "It wasn't your fault, Galinda."

"What did you say?"

_Oh NO._

"Uh, what?"

"You called me Galinda. Where did you hear that name?"

There was a very tense pause as Fiyero mentally assessed every possible excuse he could possibly use to throw Glinda off the scent, dismissed most of them for sheer unfeasibility, tried to decide which of the remainder to use, and realised he'd pretty much blown his cover anyway.

And then the tower suddenly gave an almighty lurch, sending them tumbling across the suddenly vertical floor and out the window, which quite frankly came as something of a relief.


	4. The Invasion

A/N: A new chapter at long last; once again, nothing in this story really belongs to me, I merely work within the universe provided, etc. Read, review and above all, enjoy!

* * *

Elphaba sat alone in her laboratory, her eyes open and unblinking, her hands crossed in her lap. To anyone foolish enough to peer through a window, she would have seemed utterly relaxed- and in an emotional sense, she was. On the other hand, her mind was furiously active, directing her magic into the world and focussing it on a single object.

Slowly, the armillary sphere on the floor in front of her began to rise into the air, an eerie green light cast upon it from no discernable source. As it rose further, one of Elphaba's many books slid off its shelf and began orbiting the sphere - once again, lit by emerald light. More books joined it, and before long, almost the entire library was circling around the celestial model.

This form of magic- telekinesis, her spellbooks called it- had been one of the very first inklings of her power; it wasn't until Madame Morrible had selected her for an education in magic that she actually learned how to use it on anything other than an instinctual level. Since then, she'd found that it was one of the most useful parts of her repertoire: quite apart from the usual avalanche of mundane uses she could find for it around the house, Elphaba found it was perfect for soothing her nerves.

Meanwhile, the books continued orbiting the armillary sphere, bobbing ever-so-slightly as they moved, as if they were dancing to a tune that Elphaba couldn't hear. Her eyes followed their path about the room, and as she grew more and more relaxed, she imagined the music that the books danced to...

_...and heard the sound of something enormous burrowing through the earth at an incredible speed, a sound like a hundred million termites gnawing at the rotten planks of a derelict house... _and the ear-splitting crash of the armillary sphere and all the books that had been orbiting it returning to earth, and the musical shattering of glass as one heavy tome landed right in the middle of her alchemy kit.

For what seemed like hours, Elphaba sat frozen in her seat as the noise finally died away, trying vainly to forget the smell of sulphur. It took her a moment or two to recover, and when she finally did so, she realised that she'd just experienced another unpleasant glimpse of something yet to come. She sighed wearily, got to her feet and began returning the fallen books to their shelves. The last time she'd experienced such a vision, her sister had been assassinated a few short moments later, which couldn't bode well for anything in the near future.

As she swept away the smashed glassware with a wave of her hand, she remembered why she'd felt the need to calm her nerves in the first place: she'd been worried about Fiyero.

She knew well enough that Fiyero didn't need to sleep; he didn't need to eat, either; he didn't suffer any of the aches and pains that human beings suffered while walking the hundreds of miles between the house and the Emerald City. He'd been confident that he'd have been able to simply walk to the Emerald City in perhaps a day and a half at the most, and Elphaba had agreed with him.

So, assuming that he'd arrived on time, why hadn't he sent her a message notifying her?

Had he been delayed?

Or had something much more sinister prevented him from contacting her?

Could this have something to do with her vision?

* * *

It is a universally recognized fact that scarecrows, being made of burlap and straw, don't have to worry too much about falling to their deaths; so, the worst injury Fiyero sustained when he hit the ground was a badly-bruised pride. True, it took him a minute or so to untangle his legs and retrieve his battered crown from the wreckage of the tower, but once he'd managed that, he was on his feet and ready for just about anything.

Unfortunately, he was immediately met by a sight he couldn't have possibly prepared for:

In the plaza that bordered the palace and its grounds, a colossal stone fist was punching its way through the paving stones; and there was another one tearing through the ground by the Grand Library; everywhere Fiyero looked, there were craggy stone hands reaching upwards- _climbing _upwards- and if the distant screams and cries for help were any evidence, it was happening all over the city.

Frozen in disbelief, Fiyero watched as the owner of one of the closest of these hands finally clawed its way through the road and clambered into the light at long last, sending terrified citizens fleeing for their lives.

The stony figure that had emerged was well over seven feet tall, with worryingly long arms and tiny, stump-like legs; its carved face, plainly-featured as it was, was almost expressionless, though Fiyero could clearly see its eyes scanning the plaza. As he watched, the thing marched slowly but relentlessly towards one of the buildings on the opposite end of the square. Halfway across the cratered plaza, a guardsman came charging up to the invader, waving his sabre ineffectually at it and bellowing a demand for its surrender. Without even bothering to turn in his direction or even stop walking, the stone soldier grabbed the guard by the side of his head and began to _squeeze_...

Fiyero quickly looked away, just in time to see Glinda floating to the ground, looking shaken but otherwise unharmed. "What in Oz is going on?" she asked nobody in particular.

"I think," shouted Fiyero over the sound of collapsing buildings, "We're being invaded."

_And we don't even have a proper army. Wonderful._

By now, the first of the enemy soldiers had reached the Museum of Oz, and in the process of getting there, it had ripped three guards limb from limb and trampled a pedestrian to death. It fastened its stone fingers around one of the emeralds adorning the building's wall, and began slowly prising it free. In the distance, Fiyero could see more of the soldiers engaged in similar acts of vandalism, pausing every so often to crush any guardsman foolish enough to try and stop them.

_Who are these people?_ Fiyero thought, over the wet, rhythmic splattering sounds of a guardsman being grabbed by one leg and thrashed against a wall._ Why are they stealing the emeralds off the walls of my city? Wait a minute, did I just think "my city"? I'm getting too used to being King..._

There was a loud rumble from somewhere nearby, and Fiyero looked up just in time to see another stone man looming over him; it was almost identical to the first- same plain features, same proportions, same pale grey stone. There was a pause, as its eyes swept across him and Glinda, and then it spoke in a voice like the roof of a cave collapsing; "Your Royal Highness, We are officially placing you under arrest."

"What?"

"We are officially placing you under arrest, Your Highness," the stone man repeated, its voice utterly toneless. Tik-Tok's voice sounded jaunty compared to this emotionless rumbling.

"For your protection, Your Highness," it added.

Fiyero severely doubted this. He turned to run, only for the soldier to clamp one hand down on his shoulder: "Please do not resist arrest, Your Highness," droned the soldier. "We do not wish to cause you unnecessary harm, but if it will prevent you from escaping, we are more than capable of removing your limbs-"

There was a violent flash of orange light from somewhere behind the soldier: in a matter of seconds, hundreds of tiny cracks and fissures raced up and down it's stone body, and in the next instant, it exploded. Shaking loose bits of gravel out of his clothing, Fiyero looked up from the place where the soldier had once stood, and saw Glinda standing behind it, holding her wand in one shaking hand.

"That," said Glinda, "Was a lot easier than I thought it would be."

_You've learned a lot in the last year, haven't you, Glinda?_ Aloud, he asked, "Can you repeat that spell if we run into any more of these creatures?"

"I can repeat it, but it takes a few seconds for the magic to build up enough to kill them... so I think we might need a few reinforcementors."

"Your Highness!" called an urgent voice.

FIyero turned around to see the Captain of the Guard hurrying up to him, followed by Boq, Tik-Tok and a few other guardsmen. All of them were coated with a fine layer of ash and dust, and most of them looked extremely worried- except, of course, for Tik-Tok. "Thank Oz you're alright, Your Highness!" puffed the Captain. "We're getting reports from all over the city about these things- we've counted no less than seven hundred of them, and there are more of them emerging from the earth every minute!"

The newly-crowned king of Oz thought carefully. "Do these things have any weaknesses?" he asked. "Apart from magic," he added, noticing Glinda's pointed look.

"I-Strongly-Suspect-That-Blunt-Instruments-Might-Suffice," intoned Tik-Tok.

"Or explosives!" said Fiyero excitedly; ideas were pouring into his brain in a frenzy- suddenly, the situation didn't feel so dire after all. "Captain, do we have anything explosive that could be used against these things?"

"Well, we have a store of grenades in the armoury, Your Highness, but I'm not sure if we have the manpower to mount an attack."

"Yes we do!" Fiyero shouted, throwing caution to the winds. "Miss Glinda here has a perfectly serviceable airborne regiment on hand!"

Glinda's jaw dropped. "How in Oz did you find out about _that?"_

"The same way I know that your name used to be spelt Galinda with a "Ga"," he said flatly, ignoring the sound of Boq's own jaw dropping with a _clank._ "Now, can your soldiers handle matches and fuses?"

"Well... yes. But do you really think we should bring them out _now_? We don't want to panic the citizens any more than they already are, do we?"

As if in answer, there was a tremendous explosion from somewhere to the east, and the screams of the people briefly increased in volume. Glinda lowered her head despairingly, and very slowly drew a tiny golden whistle from her dress. "Before I use this," she added softly, "I want you to promise that they won't be harmed once this business has been cleared up."

"You have my word as King of all Oz," said Fiyero solemnly. He turned to the Captain: "I need your men to start evacuating the citizens as quickly as you can; there's no telling just how destructive this counterattack will get."

The Captain nodded, whispered an order into the ear of the nearest runner, and watched as the man hurried off to the barracks to organize the men. "With all due respect, your Highness," he said uncertainly as he turned back to Fiyero, "Could I ask what it is you're planning?"

At that point, Glinda blew a single note on the whistle; the sound that emerged seemed to warp the air as it moved, curling insidiously around their heads and doing unpleasant things to their eardrums as it shivered through the air- towards the palace. There was a pause, and then an answering shriek echoed from the base of one of the towers, as every single window on the ground floor swung open and the inhabitants surged outwards into the burnt-orange sky.

Nobody needed to be told what these creatures were: after all, the flying monkeys had been servants of the Wicked Witch of the West far too long for anyone to forget their ghastly silhouettes in the sky. As a fresh burst of terrified screaming rang out across the city, Fiyero turned around and discovered that most of the guardsmen that had arrived with the captain had turned tail and run for their lives; the captain himself was looking more than a little bit apprehensive; Tik-Tok's face was naturally expressionless; as for Boq, his growing suspicion was written very clearly on his face.

Meanwhile, Glinda was shouting orders to the monkeys as they soared past her: "To the armoury, Chistery! Get the grenades and destroy as many of the enemy soldiers as you can!" From somewhere in the swarm, Chistery yowled in the affirmative as it swooped towards the Emerald Guard Barracks and the armoury hidden inside. A moment later, they came swarming out of the building, each one carrying a small pouch of grenades- simple clay spheres with a rope fuse.

"Alright," hissed Boq, grabbing Fiyero by the shoulder and dragging him well out of earshot, "Let's hear some answers, Scarecrow. How the hell did you know Miss Glinda's original name?"

"How did _you?"_ Fiyero shot back; the events of the day were beginning to wear out his friendly demeanour. So far, he'd been forced to walk mile after mile across open country to reach the Emerald City, been made King against his will, earned a tutorial of every single diplomatic procedure that the Wizard had never used, and been tipped out of a window and into a warzone. About now, he was sick of being Mr Scarecrow, the paragon of previously inanimate objects, and as for His Royal Highness, Scarecrow the First, he could go jump in a bonfire.

Somewhere in the distance, the first of the grenades exploded, and there was a ragged cheer from the guards as more explosions rang out across the skyline. Ignoring them, Fiyero continued ranting: "You weren't too shocked when the flying monkeys showed up, were you?" he sneered, enjoying Boq's outraged expression. "Of course you didn't- you followed her into their living quarters, right?"

"Someone needs to protect her!" Boq snarled defensively. "You wouldn't imagine the assassination attempts this she's dodged in the last few months."

"Any houses involved?"

"_WHAT EXACTLY IS THAT SUPPOSED TO MEAN?" _roared Boq. He'd struck a nerve.

Glinda swivelled around. "Your Highness, Mr Tin Man; would you both kindly shut up?"

The two lapsed into sullen silence, glaring furiously at each other. Then, they saw Glinda's expression.

"Something's wrong," she whispered softly.

* * *

Chistery had felt the change in the air as well; much like Glinda, he'd been around magic long enough to recognize the distinctive flickers of energy that preceded a very powerful spell- a spell of transformation. Somewhere out there, a magician was casting his or her will across the landscape, reaching out towards the Emerald City.

The monkey to his left let out a screech of warning, and Chistery darted to the left as a huge chunk of masonry rocketed into the air: by now, the enemy soldiers had noticed that they were being attacked and destroyed, and were retaliating the only way they could- with the very buildings they were destroying. As Chistery twirled out of the deadly missile's path, he heard the blood-curdling scream as it struck the monkey behind him, shattering his bones and knocking him clean out of the air.

Chistery saw the soldier who'd hurled the chunk of rock at him and swooped downwards, readying the fuse on one of his grenades as he went. Closer and closer he flew, picking up speed; perhaps fifty feet away, details of the enemy soldier came into view: it was much taller and much more imposing than the others, and the rock that composed its body was darker and craggier. Then it turned to face Chistery with a face that, unlike all the other soldiers so far, had an expression.

This, Chistery realised, could only be one of the enemy officers.

A disgusted sneer slowly spread across the officer's face as it raised a fist towards the oncoming attacker.

Chistery gritted his teeth as he sped closer and closer to the officer; he didn't think of what would happen if he was too slow to dodge the officer's counterattack, or if he simply crashed into it head-on; in the years since Elphaba had given him wings, he'd learned that _thinking _about horrific mid-air collisions couldn't exactly help him avoid them. So, he all thought of at that moment was depositing the grenade; instinct did the rest.

As the fist swept towards his face, Chistery dived downwards, between the officer's legs; he had just enough time to catch a glimpse of the shattered paving stones rocketing towards him before his wings kicked in again, slowing his descent just enough to let him hit the ground on all fours without breaking his limbs. Before his opponent could figure out what had just happened, Chistery let the grenade in his hands clatter to the ground as he scampered away across the potholed street, up the side of a half-demolished house, and onto the railing of a balcony

There was a deafening boom as the fuse finally ran out. Once his ears had stopped ringing, Chistery turned around to see, to his shock, that the officer hadn't been completely destroyed in the blast: its legs had been completely shattered, as were its left arm and most of it torso, but it obviously wasn't quite ready to give up the ghost just yet, for it was now crawling slowly towards him.

With every inch it crawled, a few chunks of the rubble that had once been its body would roll across the paving stones and reattach itself to the officer.

Chistery was already lighting the fuse of his last grenade when he felt magic flooding the air around him- the blast front of the spell he'd felt building up a few minutes ago. He could feel it permeating him, oozing through his flesh and bone as it swept across the city, and suddenly...

...he couldn't move...

There wasn't any pain, but his feet were anchored to the railing, and a steady numbness was consuming his body below the waist. It took him a moment or so to realise that the spell that had struck him was slowly turning his body to stone.

The officer had repaired its lost arm, and was now knuckling gleefully towards him.

And the grenade was still in Chistery's hand, even as the spell claimed his hips.

Even for the parts of his body that hadn't been petrified, movement felt impossibly slow; but he had to get rid of the damn explosive while he still had the chance, or he'd be reduced to so much gravel and shredded meat.

He drew back his arm...

...thrust one arm out...

...and a small clay sphere went flying through the evening sky.

The last thing that Chistery saw was the look of surprise on the officer's face before the grenade blew it to pieces.

* * *

In less than thirty seconds, every single one of the flying monkeys had been petrified; those who'd been unlucky enough to be in flight at time had tumbled out of the sky and shattered themselves to pieces on the ground below. Many had managed to reach a safe perch in time, but that was little comfort to Glinda, whose attempts to lift the spell had all been in vain. For a time she'd stood, crying brokenly as she tried again and again to dispel the petrifaction, until at last, she fell silent.

And now it seemed as though the situation could only worsen:

Fiyero surveyed the marble statue in as calm a manner as he could manage; this wasn't easier, as he was standing on the outskirts of a war zone, his only army had just been wiped out, the enemy was still at work in the city, and the captain of his guard had been reduced to one of the most undignified-looking statues in all of Oz.

"When did this happen?" he asked softly.

"Only-A-Few-Moments-Ago," Tik-Tok intoned. "The-Petrifaction-Was-No-Doubt-Cast-On-The-Entire-City, So-All-Of-Its-Inhabitants-Were-Exposed-To-It." And, indeed, the city did sound noticeably deprived of all human noise: apart from the occasional explosion and the distant thudding of enemy soldiers marching down the street, the city was almost completely silent. And, worsening the group's already dismal mood, several petrified citizens could be seen across the plaza, frozen in the act of running for their lives or cowering under what little shelter they could find.

"Then why haven't _we_ been effected?" whispered Boq.

"Well," said Glinda, her voice hoarse from crying, "I can protect myself against enemy enchantments if I have enough time to prepare... if not Chistery and the others," she added bitterly. "I don't know how you three survived, though."

"I-Would-Presume-That-The-Spell-Only-Targets-Living-Beings, Making-Me-Immune-To-Its-Effects." Tik-Tok's mobile moustache twitched with artificial pride. "As-For-His-Majesty-And-Mr-Tin-Man, I-Would-Presume-That-The-Same-Rule-Applies."

_No it doesn't,_ thought Fiyero. _We're both living beings- well, after a fashion, I suppose. Either we're just more resistant to this spell's effects, or whoever's casting it wants us alive._

"Look," he said flatly, "Whatever happened here, we've got to get out of this city, find help somewhere."

"What kind of help?" asked Boq suspiciously.

Fiyero briefly grappled with the idea of admitting that Elphaba was still alive, and almost immediately decided against it. "Just because these things have taken the Emerald City doesn't mean they've taken the rest of Oz," he pointed out. "It doesn't matter if the other countries of Oz don't have armies of their own- once they hear what happened, they will _raise_ armies against these things! All we've got to do is get out of here, and we can get started!" He turned to Tik-Tok: "How far is the nearest pathway out of the city?"

"Approximately-Half-A-Mile, Your-Highness."

"Right! Let's get moving! Come on!"

There was a pause, and then they all began hurrying across the plaza, listening very carefully for the sound of approaching footsteps; as they ran (and Tik-Tok lumbered) Fiyero wondered exactly what he'd been thinking in the last few minutes. _Raising an army? I must be out of my mind. There's no way in hell we'll be able to raise anything against these things- if the enemy had any sense, they'll have petrified everyone in Oz long before attacking this city._

Fiyero shook his head; he couldn't keep thinking like this, not now that the escape attempt seemed to be going so well: after all, nobody had seen them, nobody had stopped them, and best of all, Tik-Tok had no trouble whatsoever keeping up, in spite of his bulky frame. And then, Fiyero heard Boq say, "Miss Glinda, what's wrong?"

He turned to see that Glinda had stopped right in the middle of the road; Boq was holding her arm and trying to guide her along, but she might as well have been a thousand miles away for all the attention she paid it. Eventually, her distant gaze met Fiyero's.

"The Grimmerie," she said softly.

"What about it?"

"I left it in the palace."

"Never mind the Grimmerie!" Boq hissed. "They'll never find it the way they're wrecking the city!"

"I can't take that chance." Her voice was hard. "If it ends up in the enemy's hands, I'll have failed her again... and I'm not going to let that happen." A sad smile crossed her face. "It was nice knowing you, Scarecrow; good luck, Your Highness."

Suddenly, Boq was lying in a heap, and Glinda was sprinting back across the road towards the palace; none of them were in a position to stop her- Boq was still trying to get back on his feet, Tik-Tok's speed was set at an ambling walk, and Fiyero's limp-legged stride didn't cover too much ground at the best of times, so before long, she was out of their reach.

"Why are you just standing there?" Boq howled at the two of them. "Help me up! We're going after her!"

"This is no time to act on your obsessions, Tin Man; we've got to get out of here!"

"Are you insane?" he demanded, as he clattered awkwardly upright. "We can't just leave her alone in the palace with-"

"Tin Man," said Fiyero as patiently as he could manage, "She's learned enough magic to kill these things permanently; the one she destroyed didn't try to put itself back together again. She'll be fine."

"But... but... I can't just-"

"Logically-Speaking, Mr-Tin-Man," interjected Tik-Tok, "Miss-Glinda-Is-Not-Only-Capable-Of-Defending-Herself, But-Pursuing-An-Equally-Important-Goal: The-Grimmerie-Is-An-Immensely-Powerful-Magical-Artefact, And-Cannot-Be-Allowed-To-Fall-Into-Enemy-Hands. Should-We-Follow-Her, We-May-Draw-Unnecessary-Attention-To-Her-And-Compromise-Her-Mission, Possibly-Resulting-In-Her-Death-Or-Capture. For-Now-We-Have-No-Choice-But-To-Depart."

If Boq still had lips, he would have bitten the lower one in indecision; he obviously couldn't just leave Glinda to go on what might very well be a suicide mission, but at the same time, he couldn't follow her and endanger his life. After a minute or so of hemming and hawing, he let out a rattling, metallic sigh; "Alright," he said, despairingly. "Let's get out of here."

However, as they continued onwards, they heard something that made Boq halt once again- a sound like badly-greased wheels; Fiyero turned and saw that the Tin Man's face was frozen in an expression of shock. "Oh no," he whispered. "That's all we need..."

"What's wrong?"

There was another metallic squeal, followed by a loud burst of maniacal laughter.

"I've seen these things before on the Yellow Brick Road," said Boq, passing his axe from hand to hand in agitation. "They weren't too much trouble even at the worst of times, unless someone hired a group of them as mercenaries. If they're still alive now, it means that they're working for the enemy in bulk, and we're in serious trouble..."

"Why? What are they?"

A brightly-coloured blur whizzed to a halt on the other side of the road, and Fiyero found himself staring at a roughly human figure dressed in a garish suit of silver and red that glittered malevolently in the firelight of burning buildings; it's grinning face was painted like a clown's, and it's enormous eyes rolled wildly from left to right. Instead of hands and feet, this stranger had wheels; they squeaked and squealed as he rolled gently towards them, giggling madly.

From somewhere behind the figure, there were more peals of laughter, and more squeaks- the sounds of an army rolling their direction.

"They're Wheelers."

* * *

The palace was still intact, for the most part: a few of its towers had been torn down, and most of the emeralds had been torn from the outer walls, but otherwise, it was more or less in one piece. And by now, it was completely empty except for the petrified workers; they littered the hallways, crammed shoulder-to-shoulder in their last panicked rush towards the nearest exit. Thankfully, Glinda hadn't hidden the Grimmerie in any of the lower offices, or she'd have found it almost impossible to reach without smashing her way through the ranks of statues.

As a matter of fact, the secret of where she kept the priceless spellbook was the subject of considerable gossip among the staff; so far, most of them seemed to believe it was buried deep in the vaults of the palace, or suspended just above the tip of the highest mountain in the country. Glinda had laughed to herself when she'd heard these rumours; she kept the Grimmerie in a much safer place- specifically, the locked drawer of her desk.

She hurried down the main hallways as quickly as she could, trying not to think of petrified figures crashing to the ground and shattering to pieces, trying not to wonder if Chistery had been among them. With a ragged snarl of frustration, Glinda forced herself to think of something else: for example, how anyone had managed to cast a spell of petrifaction on the _entire city? _Quite apart from the ridiculous amounts of energy it would have required, the city itself was supposed to be protected against spells of that magnitude; from what little Glinda had managed to glean from the gigantic stacks of paperwork on the subject, the Wizard had commissioned a number of loyal magicians to outfit the city with a very sophisticated runic system to prevent any dissenters from attacking it with magic- at least, directly.

Of course, there were no answers to be found; she might as well ask how the Wizard managed to attract so many magicians into his service even when they _knew_ he didn't have any power of his own.

_Except I know the answer to that one already,_ she thought bitterly. _Why do I keep asking myself such stupid questions?_

All but hurling the door open, she dashed into the throne room and made her way to the very back of the chamber; during the lead-up to the coronation, her desk had been unceremoniously shoved behind one of the curtains, and hadn't been moved since then. It took about four seconds to unlock the drawer and retrieve the book; after that, Glinda was running back across the room and through the corridors towards the entrance hall.

She was dashing across the polished marble floor of the entrance hall, the gates in sight, when she heard a voice like grinding rock say, "Why exactly does his Majesty want this building spared?"

Glinda stifled a gasp of horror; the voice was right outside the front door. She began readying her magic for another stone-shattering blast of energy: hopefully, there'd be only one or two of them. If there were more, she might be able to subdue them for a time with lesser spells, long enough for her to make her escape.

"He said he wanted it as a reward for the witch's services when the rest of Oz is subjugated," said another grinding voice. "On top of those... organic components she requested," it added with a note of disdain. "Have the Wheelers reported any survivors in the area?"

"The last communiqué noted that sixteen individuals had been found and executed; it would seem that even the Wheelers have some semblance of use. The Scarecrow has yet to be located however. Is that why we have been sent here?"

"Presumably. It..."

There was a dangerous pause, and the officer's stone eyes focussed on the human that had been trying to sneak past them. "Is that-"

As the rubble that had once been the first officer landed at the bottom of the stairs, Glinda took the opportunity to start running; however, as she reached the edge of the plaza, she was immediately brought up short by a trio of soldiers marching down the street towards her. Hurrying in the opposite direction, she quickly realised that she must have triggered some kind of alarm, because soldiers were charging into the plaza from every single connecting street.

In desperation, she let her magic blast outward through her wand, detonating the nearest of them, before telekinetically sweeping another one off its plinth-like feet and hurling it back into the oncoming horde. She cast every single form of magic she'd learned in the last few months at the soldiers, and though several were smashed to pieces in the blizzard of energies- if not completely disintegrated- dozens more appeared to replace them. Glinda didn't care; so long as she had the chance to destroy the Grimmerie before they killed her, she didn't mind.

However, as she prepared another spell, the soldiers and officers suddenly ground to a halt; then, as one, they began moving very quietly into two lines. The pathway they formed led to the opposite end of the plaza, where something was slowly digging its way through the cratered ground.

Whatever it was, it was clearly enormous; it stood taller than the four-story building behind him, and it didn't appear to have set foot on the ground. From what Glinda could see by the pale glow of the streetlamps, it had the same rocky grey skin as the soldiers and the officers, but its imposing features seemed curiously... human. Its face bore the faintest hint of a neatly-trimmed beard, and though Glinda couldn't be certain, it seemed to be wearing a five-tined crown. One thing that couldn't be denied was the fact that it was smiling.

"**I must admit, I wasn't expecting to encounter a capable witch here, of all places," **it tone was curiously dignified, almost charming, but there was no mistaking the menace present. **"You are Glinda the Good, yes?" **it inquired.

Glinda nodded hesitantly.

"**A pleasure to meet you, dear lady," **it purred. **"You may call me the Nome King; these," **he indicated the ranks of stone figures beneath him, **"are my retinue, and we are here on affairs of state."**

Glinda swallowed, and finally found her voice: "In other words, you're taking over the country."

"**That is one reason for my being here, yes. I was also seeking an audience with his majesty, the Scarecrow, but alas, it seems that our meeting shall have to wait until my operatives track him down. Rest assured, my troops will find and arrest him..." **The King's smile broadened.** "...and I have a most intriguing specimen to study while I wait. Though I think you should probably surrender the Grimmerie before we continue our conversation, or else my officers may become disagreeable."**

"She isn't going to agree, Your Majesty," said one of the nearest officers. "We should just kill her and take the book from her remains."

**"As practical as that suggestion may be, I would allow her to respond first."**

Five crowded seconds later, Glinda's wand was glowing cherry red, and smoke was gently pouring from her fingertips; the entire left side of the Nome King's face had been blown off in the ensuing barrage of magic, and most of his army looked in the mood to attack. However, as the scattered chunks of stone began to take the shape of the King's face again, Glinda could clearly see that he was still smiling. **"Ah," **he said, his voice delighted, **"A _challenge. _Stand aside, gentlemen: we shall see how the Defender of Oz fares in a duel of magic..."**


	5. Apparent Last Stands

A/N: Here we are, ladies and gentlemen: the latest chapter. I hope you enjoy it. Read and review, as always; remember, constructive criticism is welcome!

* * *

In the days before her friendship with Elphaba had blossomed, Glinda would never have even thought of opening a book, let alone reading it. However, those days of carefree hedonism were long-dead and since then, Glinda had done quite a bit of independent research- and not just on magic, either. In one of the enormous tomes of history she'd ended up leafing through for evidence to support Animal Rights Laws, there'd been a very interesting chapter on Wizard's Duels:

In the days before the Wizard had come to power, it wasn't entirely uncommon for rival magicians to settle their differences with a fight to the death, using only the most destructive and violent magicks in their repertoires. Of course, given the sheer amount of property damage that would result, the Wizard outlawed the duels as soon as he had the authority to do so; to keep down any "unofficial" duels, he also kept the more powerful magicians in the country as preoccupied as possible, distracting them with impressive job offers, luxurious homes, and other incentives. Madame Morrible herself had been pacified by the position of headmistress at Shiz University… and later, as the Wizard's press secretary.

When they _were_ called upon to fight, the magicians and witches of this new regime generally refused to get within a mile of their enemies, preferring to blast them with lightning from afar. _Or drop houses on them_, Glinda reflected bitterly.

And now, decades after the duels had been banned and all but forgotten, with the Wizard gone, his citizenry dead and the wreckage of his empire all around her, Glinda was about to fight the commander of the invading forces in a Wizard's Duel.

* * *

The first explosion didn't come as much of a surprise, and to be honest, neither did the barrage of masonry hurled in her direction: fire and telekinesis were pretty standard as far as offensive spells went. True, it felt a bit strange to be on the receiving end of them for a change, but with a well-chosen magical shield, it wasn't too much of a problem.

As the Nome King readied another blast, Glinda counterattacked with a surge of energy that tore the giant figure's left hand off and sent it rocketing away across the skyline. This time, the King didn't bother to wait for the disconnected stone to rejoin him; he simply eyed the stump with annoyance and let a new hand form. And then the discarded original hand came hurtling back through the sky, thundering into Glinda's shield and almost knocking her flat on her face. It took another blast of magic to actually _kill _the wretched thing and stop it from trying to crush her feet, and by that point, the hand's owner had telekinetically detached the roof from one of the neighbouring buildings and lobbed it at her.

For the next five minutes, they fought: the King had an extraordinary amount of magical power at his disposal, not to mention the ability to regenerate at will, but he didn't have Glinda's agility and speed. _I suppose when you're a seventy-foot-tall monstrosification with a face like the side of a mountain, I suppose everything looks impossibly fast_, she thought snidely, ducking a hail of needle-sharp stalagmites and returning fire with a bolt of lightning that almost scoured the King's face blank.

Glinda couldn't keep this up forever; handling so much magic at such a phenomenal rate was beginning to tire her out. The Nome King was toying with her, by the looks of things, waiting for her to exhaust herself to the point of collapse before killing her and taking the Grimmerie. She had to think of a new strategy, and _fast_; she wasn't prepared to see the Grimmerie (Elphaba's last gift to her) in the hands of some warlord hell-bent on destroying everything they'd worked for. And even though she was at a serious disadvantage, there were a few aces left up her sleeve- maybe not enough to kill the King, but maybe enough to buy her the time to transport the Grimmerie well out of the King's reach.

A flickering tongue of energy lashed her wand out of her hands and knocked her to the ground; against all expectation, she didn't panic. True, she hadn't quite got past the basics of using magic without a wand, but she wasn't defenceless yet...

"**You**_** are**_**capable indeed, Miss Glinda,"** purred the Nome King, all charm and swarm. **"But I wouldn't recommend continuing this duel; you're clearly beginning to tire, and I would rather that your skills did not go to waste. Now, kindly hand over the Grimmerie, and we can negotiate."**

As the King continued speaking, Glinda was very subtly opening the book in front of her: it had taken her months, but she had managed to decipher a few of the spells in here, and one of them could be very useful- if only as a distraction. Yes, there was a strong smell of paint in the air...

"**Well? Do you have an answer? Or... what are you doing?"**

She was chanting, now, all her concentration fixed upon ensuring that this spell would work: slowly, the magic surged back through the gates of the palace, towards a room that the builders hadn't quite finished repainting just yet. And then the intended effects of the spell came rushing back across the paving-stones in a colourful haze of paint and pigments; the Nome King scarcely had time to react before the multicoloured phantom was upon him.

Screaming diabolical expletives, the Nome King swatted furiously at the thing, trying vainly to pry it off his face; but because the creature was made of paint, there was nothing for him to grasp, and his attempts at swatting it away merely chipped huge pieces of stone from his head. Unfortunately, for the same reason, it couldn't hurt him, only cover his eyes and distract his attention; eventually, the King realised this, and simply burned the paint-phantom off his face with a stream of conjured flame. But by that time, Glinda had gotten her wand back, and was already casting another spell as subtly as she could without the Nomes noticing.

"**It would seem that I underestimated you," **admitted the King, brushing flakes of crisped paint from his shoulders. **"I never suspected that you were capable of actually reading the spells of the Grimmerie."**

Glinda offered a grim smile. "What can I say except for, "Don't judge a book by its cover"?"

"**True; it would seem that my informant was a touch... misinformed. His last report indicated that you were barely able to use your wand, let alone advanced sorcery: no doubt, you have developed since then."**

"_What _informant?" Glinda demanded, trying not to make the next wave of her wand too obvious. She had to keep the king talking long enough for her to complete the spell; no easy task, considering that this last ace wasn't exactly meant to travel at high speed. And then, just on the edge of hearing, there was a sound not entirely unlike an engine.

"**Oh, I think we can do without introductions for the moment. Rest assured you'll have the chance to meet later on. But let's get back to the duel, shall we? I mean, it's only just getting interesti-"**

Something large and spherical crashed into the back of the King's head, and in an instant, he and all the other Nomes were reduced to silhouettes against the brilliant light that emerged. Then the shockwave rushed across the plaza...

* * *

The Bubble had been constructed shortly after Glinda's rapid climb through the social ranks of Emerald City, and no expense had been spared in making it the perfect transport for one of the most adored figures in all of Oz. Merging powerful enchantments courtesy of Madame Morrible with intricate mechanisms of the Wizard's own design, it had been used often in the early years of Glinda's career; then, as she actually began to participate in the work of government, it fell into disuse, gathering dust in some long-forgotten corner of the palace- until now.

True, it wobbled uncontrollably at any speed higher than forty miles per hour; true, it didn't offer much defence against aerial attacks; and yes, around this time it actually looked pretty stupid. But there was one design fault that made up for all the others:

It reacted very violently to high-speed collisions.

* * *

Glinda didn't stick around to see if the King had survived the explosion. She had to get the Grimmerie as far away from him as possible- outside the Emerald City if necessary. So, the moment the Bubble had struck the King, she had torn her shoes off and started running down the steps and through the darkened streets; at the risk of making herself too noticeable, she lit the tip of her wand to guide her across the potholed ground and past the ranks of petrified citizens. _Maybe I can just transport it to the Scarecrow's house by magic,_ she thought; _they won't think to look there..._

In the distance, there was a loud grunt, and the sound of a new body emerging from the shattered paving-stones. **"OW," **said the faint voice of the Nome King.

She didn't have much time, now. All she needed was a place to hide while she readied the spell... just a few more yards... and if she couldn't manage that, she could at least try and give herself a decent pair of wings to fly away with.

There was a rumbling somewhere beneath her, and the King's voice murmured, **"I admire your ingenuity, Miss Glinda."**

"Obviously not enough to let me escape," Glinda panted sarcastically.

The chuckling from beneath rattled the paving stones. **"It wouldn't matter even if I did let you escape just this once. I mean, how do you think I'm following you now? I can **_**feel**_** your footsteps through the earth. It's the same for my agents, all of whom are fully prepared to capture you on sight... or sound."**

"I don't care," she snarled raggedly. "I don't care about your army, your power, and whatever else you've got up your sleeves... I'm going to stop you somehow, even if it kills me."

"**You **_**have **_**changed, my dear. Elphaba would be proud of your determination."**

Glinda skidded to a halt; all thoughts of escaping or hiding the Grimmerie tumbled out of her head at that moment. "How do you know that name?" she hissed, flame suddenly roaring from the tip of her wand. "Answer me!"

"**All in good time, Miss Glinda. But first, allow me to apologise in advance..."**

A massive stone fist hammered up through the road just inches away from Glinda, tumbling her to the ground; she landed heavily on her back, her wand gone from her hand and the Grimmerie lying just out of reach. She tried to get to her feet, only for a pair of stone hands to emerge from the ground and fasten around her arms and legs, dragging her back down; another followed, wrapping itself swiftly around her face and imprisoning her head in coffin-like darkness.

Thankfully, there was just enough space for her to breathe... and to hear what was happening outside...

"There!" cackled a voice. This one wasn't the eldritch purring of the King or the grinding monotone his soldiers used, but the rasping tones of an older human woman who'd scraped the inside of her throat raw from screaming in rage. "Hold her still, boys!" said the voice. "It's time I claimed my prize."

"**No."**

"What?"

"**This one is far too dangerous for your keeping, Mombi. She will be much more secure in my custody."**

"That wasn't the deal!" she whined petulantly. "You said I could have any head from any citizen of Oz I wanted, and you know how much I like the pretty faces!"

"**I do, Mombi. And believe me, this decree is for your protection; I doubt you would much appreciate having your palace and everything in it being burnt to the ground by one of your collection, simply because you failed to check if it knew magic in life; this one in particular may know enough to resist your spells of taming. Apparently, she is not quite as incompetent as you were led to believe."**

"How competent are we talking about, here?"

"**Competent enough to read the spells of the Grimmerie."**

Mombi laughed hysterically. "_This_trollop? She couldn't read a stop sign without help! She barely passed Madame Morrible's magic course with the help of her second-best student! Give me that axe and we'll see just how capable this brainless beauty is..."

"**No, we **_**won't,"**_said the King, his voice suddenly harsh. **"You can have any other head in the Emerald City: this one- along with the information in it- is **_**MINE**_**. Now, I have made it clear that this decree is for your benefit, and again you insist on endangering yourself and my plans; do not try my patience, Witch. Now, have your Wheelers captured the Scarecrow yet?"**

"No, but-"

"**Then you have business elsewhere. Don't let me detain you."**

The Nome's grip on Glinda's head shifted, allowing her a split-second glimpse of a haggard-looking woman, clad in the tattered remains of a once-expensive dress, stomping away through the ruined city with a large axe in one hand. Then the cloying mass of a sleep spell descended upon her, and everything went black.

_I'm so sorry, Ephaba. I failed you..._

* * *

"Stay back!" Boq ordered.

The Wheeler let out an ear-splitting peal of laughter. "Tin Man!" it yowled happily. "Where are all the other officers, Tin Man? Gone to stone, Tin Man! Yes, Tin Man, to stone, to stone!" It laughed uproariously. "Give up the Scarecrow, Tin Man, or we flatten you under our wheels and use you as chassis!"

"Are we _really _going to take these things seriously?" Fiyero muttered.

"The-Last-Time-We-Took-Them-Lightly," said Tik-Tok solemnly, "We-Fell-Victim-To-A-Surprise-Attack. They-Were-Hired-As-Mercenaries-Then, Just-As-They-Are-Now; The-Mercenary-Wheelers-Ingest-Large-Amounts-Of-Mind-Altering-Fungi-Before-Battle, Making-Them-Even-More-Dangerous-In-Combat."

"And this one's got reinforcements on the way," hissed Boq, hurriedly tightening Tik-Tok's works. "You'd best get behind cover, Your Highness; this won't be pretty."

The Wheeler laughed in agreement, and then threw back its head and let out a weird, honking call; to Fiyero, it sounded uncannily like a bicycle horn. As if in answer, someone in the ruins nearby screamed in terror. But that was quickly drowned out by the squeaking of wheels, and a growing chorus of bicycle-horn cries, getting closer and closer... until their source finally burst into the street in front of them.

Four people dashed from an alleyway to the left, their eyes wide and their clothes ragged and soaked with blood; three of these survivors made it to the entrance to the next alley before the petrifaction spell finally caught up with them and froze them in place. The straggler who lagged too far behind was quickly brought crashing to the ground in a lacerated heap by the pursuing Wheelers. These ones wore large metal pads on their legs and shoulders, studded with blades and spikes, and most of them were already soaked in blood- if not layered with chunks of shredded flesh and amputated limbs.

These ones didn't even bother to order Boq's surrender, they simply charged across the road towards them in one honking, giggling, shrieking mass. As Boq raised his axe in readiness, Tik-Tok thundered into position in front of him with a borrowed mace in one scrawny hand, and Fiyero had just enough time to think _Well, so much for the army of Oz,_ before the oncoming horde slammed headlong into them.

Later, he admitted that he'd expected to see Boq slicing through the Wheelers like a hot knife through butter; what he _hadn't _expected to see was how very few Wheelers got past Tik-Tok to be sliced . True, his body looked absolutely ridiculous, and he had the land speed of a tranquilised donkey, but in combat, he was _lethal: _with his 360˚ spinning torso, the Wheelers found it almost impossible to get close enough to attack him, and with his trunk-like legs and compact frame, it was even harder to actually damage him. As such, a few Wheelers decided to try and creep around the growing pile of bodies at the clockwork army's feet to try and attack Fiyero, only to be hacked to shreds by Boq.

"Your-Majesty," said Tik-Tok calmly over the howling of a broken-legged Wheeler, "This-Is-Not-Helping. I-Recommend-That-You-Make-Your-Escape-While-The-Tin-Man-And-I-Keep-These-Ones-Under-Control."

"Well, that's not- _Oh no you don't, you bastard! -_going to help much either, is it?" yelled Boq. "There's- _hold still-_ still quite a ways until we reach the exit. If he's going to make it, he's going to need- _yaaaargh-_ protection!"

By way of an answer, there was a deafening roar from the back of the Wheeler army, and the bike-horn cry rang out again- this time sounding almost alarmed. Then, the three of them saw the source of the roar, barrelling through the attacking column of Wheelers and knocking them aside like ninepins before galloping to a halt before them.

"Need any help?" said the Cowardly Lion, cheerfully.

* * *

Several busy minutes later, Tik-Tok and Fiyero were hurrying as quickly as they could through the statue-clogged alleyways of the city; Boq and the Lion were covering their escape over seven blocks away. Fiyero wasn't entirely comfortable leaving two people he'd once counted as friends to the tender mercies of the Wheelers and whoever had hired them, but with their reassurances and the constant urging of Tik-Tok ringing in his ears, he'd had little other option.

_Glinda,_ he thought worriedly, _I hope you're doing better than _we_ are, because even if our luck holds out, even if our old friends somehow manage to kill every single Wheeler in the city, we're still going to be captured._

* * *

"So," boomed the Lion, bowling another Wheeler across the street with one sweep of his paw, "Why do you think we haven't been turned to stone yet?"

"Your guess is as good as mine," said Boq, dodging a mule-kick from one of the brighter attackers. "And the same goes for why we've been attacked, what the enemy wants, and just about every other question that's cropped up since this whole blasted invasion began."

There was an embarrassed clattering as the Wheelers finally realised that they were outmatched, and began sheepishly edging as far away from the two of them as they could without actually retreating. Boq wouldn't have minded if they hadn't had the presence of mind to gather thickly at the available exits, pointing their spiked armour plating outwards to form a lethal barricade. "Well," the Lion muttered, "This doesn't look too good. How many of them do you suppose we killed altogether?"

Boq's metallic brow wrinkled. "Maybe twenty-three between the two of us; fifty, if you count Tik-Tok's score. It looks like they're waiting for someone, though; I think we might be about to meet whoever hired them."

"Those stone men? I've seen a hundreds of them around town in the last twenty minutes; what are they supposed to be, anyway?"

"Nomes," snicked a voice behind them.

As one, Boq and the Lion turned.

The speaker at least _looked_ human; she had the same proportions and the same number of limbs as a human being, but there was something about her that seemed inexplicably _wrong_. Perhaps it was the tangled mass of hair that exploded from her head like a nest of snakes; perhaps it was the sharp-featured, skeletal cast of her face; it might have even have been the way she seemed to lean against thin air. But Boq knew that what really disturbed him were the woman's eyes, which were wide and unblinking, and seemed to focus somewhere around the jugular.

The fact that she appeared to be hiding an axe behind her back was just icing on the cake.

"Of course," she continued, "I'm not one myself, but then, you can see that."

"And just who the hell are you?"

"Call me Mombi, little tin soldier. Or call me Your Eminence, if you like: after all, I'm in charge here. Empress of Oz, you see." She let out a low giggle. "Why don't the two of you bow down to your new ruler? After all, you haven't got the stupid one with you- you're just the heartless one and the cowardly one. I'm sure the cowardly one would be very eager to bow..."

"Look," growled the Lion, "Before you waste any more time bringing up old news, I think you should know that we aren't going to be rattled by any of that. Me, Tin Man and Scarecrow got over these things a very long time ago. So you might as well just kill us both and save yourself a whole lot of time and effort."

"You're certain of that?" Mombi's voice took on a teasing note. "I think I can think of a few things that would make your heartstrings wilt, gentlemen. Oh yes, a few things here and there... like the Ballad of Nick Chopper! What a heartrending story that was! The best bit of invention I've heard all year- my complements to its author!" She curtsied mockingly in Boq's direction.

If Boq still had blood, it would have run cold at that moment. A few days after Elphaba (_The Wicked Witch of the_ West, he corrected himself furiously) had transformed him into the Tin Man, he'd realised that he couldn't just say "Oh, I used to be the Wicked Witch of the East's manservant and she accidentally obliterated my heart with a spell, so her sister saved my life by turning my body into a metallic monstrosity." So, he came up with a rather elaborate cover-story: in this version of events, he had been a poor woodcutter by the name of Nick Chopper.

In a startling display of wish-fulfilment on Boq's part, Nick had actually managed to win the heart of the woman he loved before the transformation. Of course, everything had gone wrong when a rival suitor had hired the Wicked Witch of the West to get him out of the way: hacked to pieces by his cursed axe, he was rescued by a master tinsmith who provided replacements for almost every organ or limb lost- except for his heart. And Boq stuck to this story, people had accepted it, and nobody had thought otherwise... but now it seemed that somebody knew the truth, or at the very least suspected it.

"What are you talking about?" the Lion snarled.

"An issue of misnaming," said Mombi. "I mean, _you're_ called cowardly. Hardly fair, is it, especially when we've got such a basic natural coward standing right next to you. Yes, a coward!" She turned to the crowd of Wheelers that were still watching pensively from the alley entrance. "After all, what other kind of man so craven and weak would actually cost the Munchkins their independence because he couldn't bring himself to tell the truth to a cripple? A coward! A coward and a joke!" She laughed, and the Wheelers joined in with renewed mirth, happy to hear any story that portrayed the implacable Tin Man of the Guard as a false hero.

Boq couldn't bring himself to tell Mombi to shut up: he was too busy grinding his teeth together with a sound like a whetstone in action and asking himself how this maniacal old bat could possibly know anything about his past. But she was still talking, still gloating about how he'd been a failure and a deserter on top of everything else, and the Wheelers were still _laughing_. Boq found himself too deafened the call of his own rage to hear most of it until the end:

"... And the love of his life- the woman who never noticed he was there and couldn't even remember his real name, by the way- she had a very special name for him. What was it again...? Oh, that's r-"

Boq didn't wait for her to finish: he swung his axe at her with such force that she barely had time to jump out of the way. Howling incoherently, he swung again, and this time Mombi tripped over one of the potholes in the road and fell flat on her back; Boq raised the axe for one final strike that would split the maniac's head in two... just in time to feel the distinctive rush of magic through the air.

Mombi was channelling the power of the petrifaction spell, redirecting it from free-floating energies infecting the air and refining it into a single, compressed beam of energy that shot from her fingers and struck Boq and the Lion head on. The effects were almost instantaneous; Boq didn't even have time to finish his swing before the curse claimed his skull and sent his world plummeting into the void of unconsciousness.

And perhaps that would have been the end of it had he not awoken a few seconds later to find Mombi's grinning hatchet-face peering into his eyes; an ice-cold droplet of fear landed in the pit of his stomach as he realised that he was still petrified, arms still holding his axe over his head, eyelids still frozen open. "Don't you go nodding off just yet," Mombi crooned. "I want you to see this..."

Her hand was suddenly incandescent with energies as it moved toward him; she was carving something into his chest, the magic that surrounded her hand easily tunnelling through the tough granite. It didn't exactly hurt in the physical sense, but when Boq realised what she was carving, it hurt in an entirely different way. If he could have used his voice at that point, he would have used it to scream. And worse still, the Wheelers weren't just laughing anymore, because they'd seen _The Name _being carved into his chest, and now they were all chanting it.

"There," said Mombi as she finished carving. "That's your name from now on, _Biq. _Now, sleep well, Biq; sleep well and dream of your failure for all eternity."

She waved a hand, turned on her heel, and stalked away. There was a very long pause as the Wheeler horde began to noisily disperse into the ruins, some of them in search of food, others looking for intact stores to loot. Most of them were still giggling even as they vanished, still chanting _The Name_ quietly and wondering to themselves what it could possibly mean.

Unknown to all of them, one of the spells cast in the last few minutes had been botched.

Boq, now forever known as _Biq_, hadn't lost consciousness.

* * *

"Damnit," whispered Fiyero.

"What-Is-It, Your-Highness?"

"More of those stone men, maybe eight or nine of them. They're blocking the gates."

"Does-That-Matter?"

"Tik-Tok, they'll _flatten_ us."

"Not-Necessarily, Your-Highness: I-Could-Be-Able-To-Distract-Them-Long-Enough-For-You-To-Make-Your-Escape."

"How is that any better? They'd flatten _you_, instead."

"True. But-There-Are-Always-Other-Armies. Besides, They-Might-Take-Me-Prisoner, And-I-Could-Learn-Valuable-Information-In-The-Process."

Fiyero shook his head and wondered exactly how it was possible for something with no emotions to be so damnably _enthusiastic._The only thing Tik-Tok was likely to learn was exactly how much force it would take the Stone Men to crush him into a burnished copper plate.

"Are there any other options?"

"We-Could-Always-Seek-Shelter-Within-One-Of-The-City-Vaults," Tik-Tok suggested. "You-Were-Provided-With-The-Royal-Master-Key-At-Your-Coronation, So-Obtaining-Entry-Should-Be-Easy."

Fiyero was about to remark that considering the fact that most of the invaders had arrived by burrowing through the ground, an underground vault would be the least intelligent thing they could possibly do, when an idea struck him. He felt for the golden chain looped around his burlap neck, and yes, thank goodness, here was the Royal Master Key, a simple iron key with the Royal Z-Inside-O emblem.

An involuntary smile arced across his face, and he found himself asking "Isn't there one of these vaults just a couple of minutes away?"

"Exactly, Your-Highness."

"Then let's go!"

It took maybe five minutes for them to reach the nearest vault, not counting the time it took for Fiyero to wind Tik-Tok's action and thought back up. There were also one or two moments when they thought they could feel the ground trembling very faintly beneath their feet, as though the enemy soldiers were following them through the earth; however, to Fiyero's mounting apprehension, no stone soldiers burrowed up through the earth to attack them at any point in their flight through the ruined streets. Either the tremors had nothing to do with the invaders, or...

Fiyero shook his head in a vain attempt to shake the niggling doubts from it, and realised that Tik-Tok was pointing down a long alleyway; at first glance, it appeared to be a dead end, until Fiyero noticed the tiny keyhole in the wall. Once they'd unlocked and opened the heavy brick door, they found themselves staring into one of the smallest rooms in the entire city, empty except for a few miniscule boxes. "Is this _it?"_said Fiyero disbelievingly.

"It-Would-Appear-So, Your-Highness. Shall-I-Go-First?"

"Of course," said Fiyero. _Thank Gods he volunteered. But here comes the hard part..._

He waited until Tik-Tok was well and truly inside the vault, then slammed the door shut and locked it as quickly as he could. Immediately, there came the sound of the clockwork army thumping futilely at the stonework. Eventually, the noise faded, and Tik-Tok asked "May-I-Ask-Why-You-Have-Done-This, Your-Majesty?"

"A last-ditch attempt at sending for help," Fiyero said wearily. "I haven't been King long, but I've been so long enough to know about the Last Resort protocols. The only thing left to do is to call for help: I _think_ I can remember the spell well enough, but there's no time for me to write a letter to explain what happened here. So, I'm going to send the master key..."

"And-Hope-That-They-Can-Find-This-Vault-And-Me-Along-With-It."

"Exactly."

"Why-Did-You-Have-To-Shut-Me-In-Here-Without-My-Permission?"

"Would you have agreed to leave me undefended?"

"Good-Point. Well-Done, Your-Highness. There-Is-Still-The-Matter-Of-What-You-Intend-To-Do-Afterwards."

Fiyero laughed bitterly. "I'll probably get captured," he said dryly. "But whatever happens, don't worry: just wait for a while, and help should be here soon. It might be Dorothy Gale, it might be the Wizard, it might even be Elph- uh, it might be someone else. Whatever happens, don't worry."

"I-Am-Only-A-Machine," said Tik-Tok flatly. "I-Cannot-Be-Worried-Or-Fearful, Regardless-Of-The-Circumstances. But-I-Can-Wait. I-Can-Wait-Until-My-Clockwork-Runs-Down-And-Rust-Claims-My-Body. I-Can-Wait."

"Fair enough," muttered Fiyero, and hurried away.

Blood was relatively easy to find in the ruins, as were spaces clear enough to draw the circle.

Remembering the words was harder. But he had to work quickly: there was no telling how long it would take for the enemy to find him.

Eventually, he managed to speak the words: "_Calexemephrabis Revemexpi Ardunagux Kai Trobuxis."_ It took a few seconds of chanting these words for the key to disappear from the circle, and by then, the squealing and giggling of approaching Wheelers was filling the air, accompanied by the thunderous boom of stone feet marching down the road alongside them.

_Elphaba,_ he thought quietly, as the first of many shadows appeared at the alleyway entrance,

_I really hope you're the one this spell summons, because I can't imagine how Dorothy Gale or the Wizard could possibly stop this nightmare._

_

* * *

_

Scant miles away, the Nome invasion had torn open the walls of the Emerald City Maximum Security Jail, exposing the cells to the open air and rendering just about every single containment procedure null and void. The inmates would have been overjoyed had they not been among the very first frozen when the petrifaction spell hit: however, one prisoner had survived, having more than enough skill and experience in magic to withstand the transfiguring energies.

That prisoner was now hobbling out of the city as fast as possible, pausing only to gather a few bits of clothing to augment what was left of her grey prison slacks. Occasionally, she would mutter, "I hope you prove me wrong... I doubt you will," sometimes embellishing it with a hiss of "spectaculous work, too. Where would the kingdom be without my students?"

The Nome King watched her go with an odd little smile on his rough-hewn face.

Ah, yes, everything was proceeding as planned: the Scarecrow was in captivity, the Grimmerie was safely contained within his growing library, Glinda had proved herself valuable enough to spare, and soon, Elphaba Thropp herself would join the fray.

He chuckled darkly to himself, and surveyed the ruins of the Emerald City. _This, _he thought, _is only the beginning..._


	6. Teacher and Student

A/N: Hooray! A New chapter at last. I hope you enjoy, and as always, constructive criticism is very welcome, ladies and gentlemen!

Once again, nothing of Wicked or Oz belongs to me, etc etc.

* * *

In all her years of practising magic, the weather had been her closest ally. Even within the deepest, darkest prison cell that she'd been kept in, even when inhibited by the wards the prison used to keep captive magicians under control, she could still manipulate the passage of the clouds across the sky; she'd even wreaked some petty revenge on her jailers by making it rain on them for two whole weeks. But she'd done far more in her glory days.

She'd flung lightning bolts at unsuspecting muggers.

She'd called the winds to drag truant students to class.

And once, she'd even harnessed the awesome power of a tornado for a simple assassination.

Now, she was going to do something just as extraordinary, all for the sake of leaving the city that had been her jail for the last year- especially not that it was being invaded. She felt no sadness at the death and destruction that had occurred because of this, nor did she regret the fact that her first day of freedom was to be spent on the run. By now, she'd learned to adapt to tragedy.

She felt only the need to escape... coupled, of course, with mild annoyance.

"_I hope you prove me wrong... I doubt you will." Hah! Stupid, blonde-tressed twit!_

Her hands now traced the path of several ancient and intricate magical gestures through the air, sculpting the wind into new and unusual shapes. Her last two students had chosen means of flight that best suited them- one had enchanted a broomstick, and the other had commissioned a bubble of magic and mechanism; now their teacher forced the air itself to carry her away on a gale-force wind.

She hadn't the slightest clue where she was going, but quite frankly, she didn't care.

The Emerald City was no longer a safe haven for old witches; in point of fact, the Emerald city was no more- just another province in the expanding Kingdom of the Nomes. After all, they'd already chosen a governor... and they'd chosen her all too well.

* * *

"At last!" Mombi cackled, her voice echoing across the ballroom. "It's _mine!_ I've wanted it for years, and it's _all mine now!"_ Her exalting reflections danced wildly across the mirrored walls of the chamber, cavorting madly among the golden pillars and all but leaping onto the velvet-cushioned throne. This had once been the ballroom of the palace, where the Wizard's grandest courtiers had danced the nights away; now, with more than half of the palace torn to pieces, it was Mombi's throne room.

From one of the few windows in the room, the Nome King's massive eye looked on with considerable interest: she'd been collecting her payment for the last hour or so, and the results lay in a sizeable burlap sack beside the throne. Occasionally, the sack would twitch and ooze crimson over the fine tiles. Her other possessions- a few worm-eaten pieces of furniture and one of her more talkative test subjects- had been hauled upstairs by a small procession of Nome soldiers; however, she'd insisted on keeping the Powder of Life and the Prison Orb on her person at all times.

As she frolicked insanely about the room, Mombi raved about how she planned to craft a magnificent display cabinet for all the heads she had collected, and then going about the process of altering her-

The Nome King coughed loudly.

Mombi blanched, suddenly remembering the King's other request. Digging through her tattered pockets, she retrieved the Prison Orb. On the surface, it seemed to be little more than a cheap glass bauble; however, as Mombi's hands traced the brass bands surrounding the orb, the faintest sounds of sobs and screams could be heard from within.

"The mirrors, right?" Mombi asked.

"**As agreed upon**."

She nodded, and strode over to the nearest of the mirrors, orb in hand. As she held it aloft, a faint blue glow began to creep across its glassy surface, and the screaming from within suddenly fell silent- as if something within was holding its breath. Then Mombi spoke a single word:

"OZMA."

A thick cloud of luminescent blue smoke poured out of the orb: for a moment, it hung in the air, trying to coalesce into a human shape, before a single gesture from Mombi sent the spectre tumbling into the mirror.

"How long should I keep her here?" Mombi asked over the renewed screams of the prisoner.

"**Forever. In the meantime, you have other duties; in the event that **_**she**_** arrives here, you are to signal me immediately and keep her in captivity until I arrive. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have territories of my own secure..."**

* * *

As he spoke those words, the Nome army began to burrow back into the earth. Unfortunately for any prospective heroes, there were no tunnels to follow; as earth elementals, the Nomes moved through the earth without disturbing it- unless of course, they felt like it. They left behind a city in ruins: very few buildings were left standing, and most of those were on fire anyway.

From the Emerald City, they moved on to the rest of Oz, tearing into almost every single settlement that the country had to offer. Buildings were demolished, walls were toppled, citizens were trampled to death, and acres of farmland were either excavated or burned. For this next stage of the conquest, the Nomes didn't even bother to completely emerge from the ground; so, to the terrified civilians fleeing their homes, the invading army appeared to glide eerily through the soil, destroying anything in their path- and showing particular bloodthirstiness towards chicken farms for some reason.

The armies that the Ozians _did_ have at their disposal were rendered useless before the Nome King's magic: most of the defenders were simply petrified and ground into dust, but every so often, the King would be more creative, burning them from the inside out, crushing them between thrown buildings, or pouring floods of molten metal upon them.

The slaughter was still continuing when the cloud of dust roared overhead. Nobody looked up at the sky and wondered what could have caused such a dust storm- they were too busy fighting, killing, or dying. Only one of them bothered to look up, and he already knew that the witch who'd started it was right in the middle of the cloud.

* * *

She was exhausted, now.

By now, the strain of having forced the wind to carry her for so far and so fast was beginning to weaken her. Her advanced age and the months she'd spent in the cramped and draughty confines of a diseased prison didn't help much, nor did the fact that she'd had to expend even more energy keeping the sands of the Deadly Desert from being swept into her transport as she flew across it. But she had to carry on- just for a little longer.

The dunes blurred beneath her, forming faces long forgotten: students, teachers, employers, all of them dead or running for their lives now. She ignored them: if she lost concentration now, she would almost certainly fall to her death- either dashed to bloodied pieces of the few rocks that protruded from the sand, or dissolved by the sands themselves.

But the visions carried on, nonetheless. Had the prison food been tainted? Was she diseased and feverish? Had she gone insane at some point? Why was her mind so confounded?

"Exasperitating," she muttered to herself. Her words were lost in the roar of the wind, along with the rest of her. From out of the chaos around her, a house emerged. Was this another vision? Perhaps so. Maybe Nessarose would be under it. But no, this was not the Gale house: this one was built like fortress, with reinforced walls and windows glittering with enchantments. Besides, the Gale house hadn't arrived in Oz with a garden wall surrounding it, and certainly not a garden wall studded with wrought-iron spikes.

And the woman emerging from the house was most certainly not Dorothy Gale: no, this was a completely different vision...

She managed a laugh before the winds finally gave out, sending her tumbling into the void of unconsciousness.

* * *

Elphaba looked from the rapidly dissipating cloud of dust to the crumpled figure it had dumped in the middle of the vegetable patch.

Five minutes ago, she'd been in her laboratory, trying to focus her crystal ball on events occurring in Oz (and failing- she was too agitated to concentrate) when she'd heard the roar of the wind, and had hurried outside just in time to see the dust cloud sweeping up from the desert towards her: in the six seconds she'd had to think before the cloud had broken apart, she'd sensed the magic barely holding it together, emerging from somewhere at the centre of it. And now, the stranger that the storm had disgorged was slumped face-down in the garden, ragged, bloodied, but obviously still breathing.

_Whoever this is,_ Elphaba thought, _it's obviously a powerful magician. Or a witch. The question is, does this have anything to do with my vision, and if not, why is she here?_

Gingerly, she reached down and turned the body over. As she did so, the figure stirred, and awoke.

From behind a thick mask of dirt and bruises, a familiar face looked back at her with cold, imperious eyes: even without the makeup and even with most of her silvery-blonde hair turned white, there was no mistaking the face of Madame Morrible, former headmistress of Shiz University, and press secretary to the Wizard himself. _And,_ Elphaba thought with sudden bile, _my sister's assassin._

"Well," said Morrible, "Of all the people I expected to encounterate, you were the last of them." Her voice had changed, too: where it had once been capable of swinging between doddering joviality and ice-cold menace, it had now been reduced to little more than hoarse whispers and crone-like rasping. "Does that mean that I died in the landing?"

"No," said Elphaba, barely managing to keep her voice steady. "You're very much alive."

"As are you. Assumerating I'm not imagining you, I'd be very interested to know how you survived the melting. _If _you were melted at all," she added sharply.

Elphaba ignored her: she might have already been quivering with rage, but she wasn't prepared to let the old witch provoke her so easily. "Why have you come here?"

"You mean you couldn't make an educated guess from the state of my clothes?" Morrible laughed, and was almost immediately cut off by a sudden spell of coughing. "Come now, Miss Elphaba, you've been taught far better than that. Shortly after your friend Glinda took power, she had me imprisoned for numerous offences, and for the past year, I've been languishiating in the securest of Emerald City's prisons."

In spite of herself, Elphaba found herself smiling. Morrible noticed: "Ah, now there's the Elphaba I remember," she mused nostalgically. "But before you get too happy, you're probably wondering how I came to be here."

"Well, I certainly didn't think you were given early parole for good behaviour, and I doubt very much that Glinda offered a royal pardon for your crimes- there are things even she can't forgive."

"True, but I doubt a pardon from Glinda would mean anything; she's no longer in power."

"So F- the Scarecrow's been declared king, has he?" _Come on Elphaba, pay attention; just because you're worried about him doesn't mean you're going to give every little secret away._

Morrible was now eyeing her with thinly-veiled suspicion. "I wonder how you came to know anything of _that_, my dear. Exactly how long have you been living in this wilderness?"

"That's none of your business, Morrible."

"And why not? As your teacher and mentor, I at least retainify the right to know a little about your new life."

"You gave up that right after you publicly denounced me as a traitor," Elphaba snapped, her self control briefly failing her. "Not to mention when you joined the Wizard in lying to the people of Oz about _everything, _and when you turned a blind eye to what the Wizard's "specialists" did to Doctor Dillamond! And- how could I forget this- when you _murdered my sister!_" She was all but shrieking with rage by now, her eyes shining with tears. "And those troops you sent after me on that same day- do you know what they did to Fiyero?"

"Still holding old grudges, I see," said Morrible impassively. "But it seems as though most of them would be better directed at the Wizard; after all, wasn't it he that signed the order to have the good doctor fired and re-educated to begin with? Wasn't he the one who gave me the order to have you branded as a traitor? Wasn't-"

"DON'T TRY TO DISTRACT ME!" Elphaba screamed. "I know _exactly_ what he's responsible for, Morrible- I spent years trying to bring him down for it."

"Oh, poor, naive Elphaba," Morrible purred. "If you only knew how much the Wizard was responsible for, you would have shot his balloon out of the sky as he left Oz. You see, _he_ is responsible for the catastrophication which allowed me to escape."

"What are you talking about?"

Morrible took a deep breath, coughed loudly for ten seconds, and explained: "The Scarecrow is no longer in power; as a matter of fact, the Emerald City is now in the hands of hostile forces bent on conquering all of Oz. Its inhabitants have been petrified. The Scarecrow has been taken as a prisoner of war; the Grimmerie has been seized as a prize; and your dear friend Glinda has been imprisoned for gods only know what horrible purposes the enemy has in mind. And," she added with a grunt of pain, "I think I may have broken something in the fall."

She attempted to stand up, and emitted a piercing shriek. "Yes, I think it's both my legs," she mumbled helpfully, and passed out.

* * *

It took ten minutes to drag Madame Morrible inside, lie her down on a couch, and see to her wounds. Fortunately, though her legs were broken in several places, she hadn't ended up with any shards of bone tearing through her flesh, and the diagnostic spells couldn't detect any internal injuries. However, she wasn't in the best of health, either: months in prison hadn't done her any favours, and the strain of travelling by dust storm had weakened her even further.

As she lay on the couch, asleep, Elphaba pondered what she had just been told. Had Morrible been telling the truth? What did she have to gain by lying? Was the Emerald City _really_ in ruins? She tried to put the question out of her mind until she could properly interrogate Morrible, but it still wheedled and nudged at her mind until she eventually stormed back into her laboratory and turned the crystal ball in the general direction of the Emerald City.

Not expecting a response, she let out a strangled gasp of horror as the static rapidly cleared from the surface of the crystal ball, revealing the blazing ruins of a city that had once been known for its emeralds and prosperity. As she watched in disbelief, the ethereal eye of the crystal ball roamed aimlessly across the wreckage, giving Elphaba an unwanted view of every act of destruction that had been committed against the once-great city: the monuments had been toppled spectacularly, and the statues had been defaced; residential areas were aflame, as were the residents themselves, flooding the night sky with smoke and bathing the skeletal remnants of buildings in a hellish orange glow; and in every street, there were the petrified figures of the citizens, some frozen in the act of trying to flee, some of them trying to hide under what little shelter they could find...

And in all the ruins, there was no sign of Fiyero or Glinda.

For several minutes, Elphaba sat there, feeling as though someone had just disembowelled her with a shovel. To her disbelief, she couldn't even cry over the destruction- she could only gape in horror at the ruins of the Emerald City, and wonder _Could I have done something to help? Is this my fault for not investigating my vision? What are they going to do with Fiyero and Glinda? Who's "they" anyway? _

There was a loud wheezing from nearby, and Elphaba, still reeling with shock, hurried back into the sitting room to find Madame Morrible coughing herself awake.

"For someone who's supposed to be dead," she croaked, once the coughing had subsided, "You've managed to make quite a comfortable home for yourself out here."

"It wasn't easy," Elphaba said quietly.

"No doubt it was easier after you faked your death. I wonder, did you merely exploit the rumour about water being your only weakness, or did you start the rumour yourself?"

"Don't give me too much credit: I had help."

"Oh, old teachers can never give their star pupils _enough_ credit, Elphaba, even if they've casually disregarded a promising career in the service of a generous employer. Twice."

Elphaba said nothing. She wanted to tell Morrible to shut up, to demand information on the invasion, to howl bitter recriminations as to how this was all her fault. But in the end, she didn't even had the heart left to do _that._

"Supposing you _had_ accepted the Wizard's second offer," Morrible continued, "even in the face of Doctor Dillamond's degenerification; what do you imagine would have happened next? Or better still, what if you'd agreed to the _first_ offer, even knowing that the Wizard was and always had been a fraud and a perpetrator of offences against Animals? What then? Would you have tried to change the system from the inside, or would you have just assassinated the Wizard and taken his place?"

"Is this going somewhere, Madame Morrible, or are you just delirious?"

Morrible chuckled heartily and coughed for thirty seconds before answering: "Everyone gives into temptation sooner or later. From what he told me, the Wizard took the chance to take power the moment it appeared. I jumped at the chance for higher office as soon as it was offered to me. Glinda was delayed by your escape from the palace, but she eventually accepted. As for you, you refused, or backed out of the deal when you realised you couldn't live with the results... but sooner or later, somebody will make you an offer you won't even think of refusing. One day, you'll accept corruption."

Was that despair in her voice?

Elphaba took a deep breath. This was no time for reflection; she needed to find out what happened to Fiyero and Glinda, and fast. "I've seen the Emerald City, Morrible," she said flatly.

"Ah. Terrible, wasn't it?"

"From what my crystal ball could see, yes. But who was it that invaded? You told me that the Wizard was responsible for the invasion, but how?"

Now it was Morrible's turn to take a deep breath, mixed with the chopping-wood sounds of her coughing. "Did you ever wonder where the Emerald City got its emeralds? It's a secret known only to the most important of the Wizard's advisors, and the exceedingly well-paid miners that were sent to collect them. Of course, if it were simple as mining, there wouldn't be much a problem. No, the origins of this disaster are far more diplomaticatory in nature. Tell me, have you ever heard of the Nomes?"

Elphaba shook her head.

"They're earth elementals, you see; beyond that, there's not much to talk about: hierarchical society led by a King, great cultural value given to magical power, gemstones, emotions, that sort of thing. Oz hadn't had all that much contact within them before the Wizard arrived in Oz: their Kingdom lies far beyond any of Oz's borders, and most of the time, they simply live within rock and soil; going about whatever mysterious business they go about beneath the earth... Then, one day, not too long after the Wizard had taken power, they decided to send in an ambassador to negotiate alliances and trade."

"And the Wizard put on his usual show of smoke and mirrors, right?" said Elphaba, smothering a newfound wellspring of hatred for the Wizard.

"Of course, though it did take a bit effort on the part of the actual magicians and witches in the Wizard's employ to make the illusion convincicating. One way or the other, the Nomes ended up getting the least out of the deal, because in exchange for permission to travel freely through Oz, the Wizard requested access to some of their most valuable mining territories. There was much complaining from the Nomes, but eventually their King allowed Ozian miners into their dominions- from which were taken the very emeralds that decorated the walls of the Emerald City up until tonight. And apart from the few disputes over old debts- some of which I observed personally- they remained very quiet about the whole situation."

Morrible sighed deeply. "This evening, Oz was attacked by an army of Nomes; either they finally realised that they'd been fooled, or they discovered that the Wizard was no longer in power. But then, I suspect that they've had a change of leadership as well- the old king was never brave enough to take to the battlefield himself..." She began coughing again, and when it finally subsided, there was a particularly ragged edge to her breathing

"But what about Glinda and the Scarecrow?" Elphaba demanded impatiently. "Where would they have been taken?"

"Those," Morrible wheezed, "are questions which you're going to have to answer yourself. I'd imagine they'd have been taken to the Nome Dominions, but there's no way to be certain unless you investigate the ruins and examine what little evidence they left behind... and maybe interrogate Mombi, but I wouldn't recommend it..."

"Who's Mombi?"

"As of tonight, she's the only surviving human being in the Emerald City, and the Nome King's watchdog. Gods only know what she's watching out for-" Morrible suddenly began coughing again, and as she hurriedly pressed a ragged lace handkerchief over her mouth, Elphaba saw a distinctive red stain blooming across its surface. As Elphaba looked from the bloodied lace to Morrible's bloodshot eyes, the coughing fell silent long enough for Morrible to continue speaking:

"There is another thing you need to know: if you do choose to question Mombi, you need to keep in mind that she is yet another graduate of my magic class."

Elphaba's brow wrinkled. "Is that supposed to mean anything to me?" she asked sarcastically. "Just because this Mombi was one of your former students doesn't automatically mean she's the most dangerous witch in Oz. I mean, just how powerful is she?"

"She was a capable enough student, and above average in magical strength. But the problem is, once she graduated, she disappeared for over a decade; I didn't see her again until a month or so before the Wizard left Oz... she told me that she'd managed to invent a new magical technique- keeping human organs alive even after they'd been amputatiated."

"Did she tell you why?"

"No, and quite frankly, I didn't want to know. But I did see her again after the Emerald City had fallen. She was collecting the heads of petrified citizens, restoring them to normality- with the Nome King's permission, no doubt-, and then preserving them with the spell."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Because I'd rather that my star pupil didn't end up decapitated and left to fill some space on that madwoman's shelf for the rest of eternity!" Morrible hissed urgently. "So, in the event that you choose to risk a battle with Mombi, do_ not _let yourself be captured alive!_ Kill yourself first-" _Her warning promptly dissolved into another violent coughing fit, and this time she didn't raise the handkerchief to her mouth in time to catch the small clouds of blood she was expectorating. With blood pouring from her mouth and her lungs sounding as though they were about to collapse, Morrible did the only thing she could possibly do under the circumstances.

She passed out.


	7. Parting Words

A/N: Be warned- this is going to a little short and dialogue-heavy compared to the last few, but hopefully the next few chapters will be more eventful. So, read and review- constructive criticism is welcome!

Also, I do not own Wicked, etc, never have, never will...

* * *

By the time Morrible awoke, Elphaba had just about laid waste to her own laboratory in a feverish search for anything that could be useful in her search for Fiyero and Glinda, and exhausted her limited repertoire of healing spells in trying to stop Morrible from deteriorating any further.

While the first had resulted in a satchel of homemade magical artefacts that ranged from the purely destructive to the broadly useful, all she'd ended up doing in the latter was delaying the ex-press secretary's encroaching death by a few hours- at the most. And worse still, Elphaba wasn't quite sure why she was going out of her way to try and save the woman's life.

She pondered this as she rummaged anxiously through her satchel, occasionally glancing at the worn figure of Morrible on the couch. _Why am I even keeping her around?_ She asked herself. _It's not as if I owe her my life or anything. It's not as if she'd ever done a single decent thing in her life after she started working for the Wizard. It's not as if she actually did a thing to stop these Nomes while they were laying waste to the Emerald City. It's not as if..._

_It's not as if she took you under her wing and taught you how to control your magic, _a nasty little voice remarked inside her head. _It's not as if she was the first person in Oz who valued your talents, who encouraged you, who even attempted to help you._

_And while she was doing that, the only thing on her mind was presenting me to the Wizard as his personal servant, _Elphaba sniped back. _You could not have made that anymore obvious without having me gift-wrapped beforehand._

_Is that why she was kind enough to accept your request to allow Glinda into the course? Is that why she overlooked you disrupting the history class on the day that Doctor Dillamond was replaced? _

Another violent burst of coughing from the couch interrupted her musings. Turning around, she found that Morrible, still in the middle of wheezing blood onto her handkerchief, was looking intently at the satchel Elphaba was wearing. "So," she said, once the coughing had subsided, "You really _are_ going to try and save the King and your friend. I wouldn't expect to be given a royal pardon or a parade thrown in your honour if I were you."

"And I'm not," Elphaba snapped. "This is about rescuing people I care about, not about trying to gain acceptance from the people or anything like that."

"Just as well then," said Morrible, "Because there's hardly any people left in Oz to gain acceptance _from_. The citizens of the Emerald City have all been petrified. The Nome army moves among the towns of Oz, scattering the people far and wide, and killing all those who stand in their King's path... whatever path that may be..." Her eyelids fluttered, and she gave herself a shake, as if to clear her head.

Elphaba paused in the middle of adjusting the cloak on her shoulders. "Hang on a minute- I heard what you told me just a few minutes ago: you said that all the Nomes wanted was revenge against Oz for stealing their emeralds. What else could they possibly want? Territory? Mineral deposits? What?"

"The _Nomes_ wanted revenge, yes," Morrible mumbled, her voice wavering. "They would have wanted the emeralds returned to them; they would have wanted revenge against Oz; they would have wanted the opportunity to punish the Wizard, or his successciator. They have everything they could possibly want on this night... so the question is, what does their _King_ want? I heard them talking among themselves... the King ordered them to find the Grimmerie... and to take Glinda with them even after she caused them so much trouble. Why?"

"Like you said," Elphaba sighed, "Those are questions I'm going to have to answer myself."

"There's one question you can answer right now, however."

"What's that?"

"Why do you care so much about the Scarecrow? Since when do you count him as one of your friends?"

For a moment, Elphaba was torn between the need to keep the secret, and the inexplicable urge to indulge the dying teacher's wishes. However, a bit of applied logic made her realise that, what with Oz having been apparently driven into the ground, Fiyero being deposed, and the only witness sure to die in a few short hours, it might not be all too unreasonable to answer Morrible's question.

"Since we were at Shiz together," she replied. "More specifically, ever since a certain aborted history class: he helped me carry a tortured lion cub out of the class, and he set it free." Morrible's face wrinkled in confusion, and Elphaba added, "You bumped into me a few minutes later with that acceptance letter from the Wizard, remember?"

Morrible's eyes lit up, and she began to laugh. "Prince Fiyero," she cackled, "Captain of the Guard! And the guards _told_ me that he'd been executed for trying to help you escape- you must have intervened... with the Grimmerie! My, how that tome can confuse things!"

"It was a spell to protect him from the torture," Elphaba explained, the details all but pouring out of her mouth. "I enchanted him against pain, against his bones breaking, his blood flowing, even against death... but I didn't even realise it had worked until I got a letter from the Scarecrow explaining everything. And that was when I organised the plan to fake my death and..."

Morrible shriekedwith laughter, and was immediately interrupted by another blood-coughing fit. "You know," she rasped, "For someone who disapprovated of trickery and lies, you're quite adept at it."

"You do _wonders_ for my self esteem," said Elphaba through gritted teeth, "You know that, don't you? For your information, I'd pretty much exhausted every single option available to me at the time: keeping up with my attempts to kill Dorothy and the others wouldn't have solved anything, and I've never been enough of a people person to talk down a psychotic tin man. Trickery was the only way out I had, and I know how much it hurt Glinda to have to watch my faked death, so don't presume to lecture me on the similarities between me and the Wizard."

Silence followed, and Morrible smiled mysteriously.

"And another thing," Elphaba continued, "I don't care if I have to destroy every single lie that allowed me and Fiyero to live out here in the process, but I'm going to save him and Glinda- even if I can only save them out of all the citizens of Oz, I _will_ save them."

Morrible's smile widened. "Never forget that little vow, Elphaba," she said softly. "Hold onto your resolve, and you might actually succeed." She coughed up more blood into her handkerchief. "Good grief, how long have I been talking? I must be one of the noisiest corpses in existence."

There was an embarrassed pause.

"Well?" said Morrible. "Aren't you actually planning on carrying out that daring rescue at some point in the near future?"

"What, you just want me to _leave_ you here?"

"Why not? It's not as if you'd actually be coercified into dragging along a dying old woman, especially one that you despise as much as me."

Elphaba foundered. "But... but you'd die here alone. Doesn't that mean anything to you?"

"It does indeed: it means that I won't be a burden on your limited resources, and it means that my star pupil has the speed to accomplish her goal. Besides, you forget that I spent many years as one of the least popular headmistresses at Shiz, and several more as the Wizard's chief lackey; I am more than accustomed to being alone in both the figuratory and the literary sense. Besides, it's not as if you care about what happens to me, is it?"

"Of course not! Why would I care?"

"Then be on your way."

She should have moved at that point: as Morrible said, it wasn't as if Elphaba actually cared enough about her to stay by her side.

But against her own urge to run, to take her broomstick from the laboratory and fly for the Emerald City, she stayed for another few minutes- just long enough to ask, "One last question: when you found out that Dorothy had killed me, what was your first coherent emotion?"

For the first time, Morrible's smile looked a touch melancholy. "Regret," she whispered.

"What?"

"Over the waste of such a unique talent," Morrible said quickly. "I'd never tutored a student of such power before, never seen someone who could manipulate magic by instinct alone, never even imagined that someone would be able to deciphericate the spells of the Grimmerie by intuition alone. And the thought of that glorious talent wasted on performing cheap transformations for people who'd never appreciate your power..." She sighed. "I was upset. Not upset as the Wizard, though."

_The _Wizard_ was upset? _Elphaba asked herself. _Why?_

"Do you remember what I told you about corruption?" Morrible continued. "Sooner or later, everyone opts to take the easy way out; sooner or later, you'll be given the offer to compromise your principles in exchange for everything you've ever desired. Somehow, I doubt Mombi will make that offer- she's even less inclinated towards friendly conversation than you. But perhaps the Nome King shall..."

She sighed.

"I do have one last request before you go."

"What's that?"

"I'd like to be seated in the garden: if I can enjoy nothing else about my escape from prison, I want to see if I can stay alive long enough to enjoy the sunrise..."


	8. Captivity and Corruption

A/N: And here we go again! With any luck, it's not too overdone, but, as I say, constructive criticism is very welcome!

And once again, Wicked and Oz do not belong to me, they never will, and so on and so forth.

* * *

After what felt like an eternity, Glinda awoke to find herself lying on a fairly soft mattress, staring into the kind of darkness only produced by a room without windows. For a while, she entertained the delusion that somehow, this really was just her room back in the palace but with heavy tarpaulins draped across the windows and doors; for a while, she tried to convince herself that the disastrous events of the previous evening hadn't taken place.

Unfortunately, it quickly became apparent that she wasn't awakening in her palatial bedchamber, but in an underground jail cell. Immediately, all her misery and despair at failing her duties as a protector came flooding back, along with the same inevitable line of thought; _I'm sorry, Elphaba. Even now that you're dead, I can't stop failing you in every way._

Glinda shook her head and tried to think on anything but her failure, what might have become of Fiyero and the others, and what the Nomes were doing to the Emerald City and to Oz.

Eventually, she decided to focus on her surroundings, which she couldn't see. So, she reached out… and quickly found that the mattress, though reasonably comfortable, was bare except for a single ragged bedsheet. And the wall next to her was of a very rough, craggy stone. Groaning, she sat up in bed, and found, as she stretched, that the mattress had been placed in a small alcove set right into one of the walls; _so at least I'm not sleeping on the floor,_ she thought sarcastically.

Gathering her strength, she tried to conjure a light… only for the magic to flicker away before she could cast the spell. Muttering in disbelief, she tried again, this time with a spell to construct a handheld sphere of fire. That didn't work either. This, coupled with the fact that her wand was nowhere in sight, awarded Glinda with the impression that her captor _might_ be preventing her from using magic.

…_Which leaves __**me**__ to find my way around in total darkness. Wonderful…_

Against her own fear of the dark, she stood up and began to feel her way across the wall towards the far end of the cell. _Hopefully, this'll lead me to the exit. Trouble is, where are the lights in this room? How am I supposed to see where I'm g-_

Glinda's left knee slammed into a protrusion of rock from the wall. Hissing a skin-searing expletive, she continued hobbling along for the next thirty seconds, occasionally scraping her legs against the wall. Then her hands struck the far end of the cell- a blank wall. Quickly, she felt the wall for doors, then the next wall, and the next. Eventually, she was forced to assume that the cell really didn't have any kind of entrance; trying not to lose her temper, she staggered back towards her bed and lay down on it, swearing quietly and massaging her kneecap.

_Okay, Glinda, stay nice and calm. Just because they put you in a cell without entrances or exits doesn't mean they're going to leave you here to rot. If the Nome King had wanted you dead, he'd have done that back in the Emerald City. Just relax…_

By way of automatic response, Glinda's imagination helpfully supplied her with an image of her own emaciated corpse, lying in a contorted heap on the blood-streaked mattress, clutching the half-eaten remains of her own wrist. And in a matter of minutes, she found herself standing in the middle of the room, shouting "HELLO? IS THERE ANYBODY THERE?"

Unexpectedly, someone answered with a toneless drone of "yes," apparently from the wall directly in front of her.

"Who are _you?"_

"I am your designated attendant for the duration of your sentence here."

Glinda took a deep breath. "Right. Um, where's "here" exactly?"

"You are presently in the dungeons of the Palace of Nomekind, recently constructed by His Majesty the King in celebration of his victory over the beings of flesh."

Glinda took an even deeper breath. "You haven't actually answered my question: where exactly is this palace supposed to be?"

"Beneath the Nome King's Mountain, within the Dominions of the Nomes."

"You aren't going to be more specific than that even if I ask, are you?"

"No. I have been ordered not to clarify my statements on the matter of certain predetermined subjects, so as to ensure the maximum security of this prison cell."

"Does that mean you can't tell me why I've been brought here, how long I'm going to be kept here, or why the Nomes invaded Oz?"

"This is so."

Glinda sighed deeply. _Brilliant,_ she thought, _the nearest thing to a companion I have here is bound by a decree of unhelpfulness. This is going to be even worse than an evening indoors with the Emerald City Bureaucratic Union_. "Well," she said eventually, "On the subject of things that you _can_ do, can you get some light in here? This place is starting to feel like a tomb."

"As you wish," intoned the attendant.

There was a low whirring from the walls, and suddenly the room was bathed in pale grey light that poured out of no discernable source- except, of course, for magic. Glinda was halfway through taking in the craggy rock walls of her cell, the roughly-carved sleeping alcove, the smooth stone floor, when she suddenly realised that she wasn't alone.

On the far wall of the cell, the stone face of a Nome protruded, watching Glinda closely but expressionlessly: its features were human, for the most part; they weren't remarkably attractive, but they weren't noticeably ugly, either. Everything about this face, from its hairless scalp to its expressionless lips, was plain and undistinctive, as if whoever had carved it had wanted it to go unnoticed. This face undoubtedly belonged to that of her "attendant."

"Do you have any further requests?" it inquired.

Glinda thought for a moment: what exactly could she ask a stone face in the wall of a prison cell? Would it actually answer any of her questions? As she pondered this, she realised that she was actually feeling hungry, which made a certain degree of sense, considering that she'd spent the last few hours running around, fighting for her life, panicking, and getting knocked unconscious. "Could I have some breakfast, please?" she asked, hesitantly.

The attendant nodded; then, it turned it head as if to look over its shoulder (not that it had any shoulders), and somehow disappeared back into the wall, leaving behind only a blank patch of wall. Several minutes later, the attendant's face reappeared in the wall, followed swiftly by a pair of newly-grown arms- which were, of course, holding a tray: breakfast consisted of a few slices of buttered toast, and a tin cup of water. "Enjoy," said the attendant.

"Thank you," said Glinda, suddenly remembering her manners. She was a little bit hesitant to eat, at first- after all, Prisoners of War weren't generally treated this well, were they? But eventually, hunger got the better of her, and she began eating ravenously. "By the way," she added, as she wolfed down her third slice of toast, "When I asked who you were, you never told me your name."

"This is true."

"Well, could you-"

"I am not permitted to inform you of details that do not exist," said the attendant.

Glinda blinked. "You mean you don't have a name?"

"This is so."

"But why?"

"I have not attained the Privilege of a name yet," said the attendant simply. Noticing Glinda's bewildered expression, it clarified: "I am only a lowly servant, and can only achieve the Privileges of Identity through achieving higher rank, through diligence and loyalty to my masters. In time, I may acquire a name... but beyond that, I cannot tell what I may achieve."

_Oh gods, _Glinda thought. _It really is too early in the morning for this many complicatory concepts... assuming, of course, it __**is**__ morning. Oh what the hell- if it distracts me from going completely insane from grief and claustrophobia, I'll listen to it... _Out loud, she sat down heavily on the bed, sipped at her cup of water, and asked, "Apart from a name, what exactly are these Privileges of Identity?"

"Emotions; the capacity for growth of personality; varying levels of imaginative ability; intuition; independent thought... there are many. I am unlikely to attain many."

_Oh brilliant. We've been conquered by a race that considers things like names and emotions to be a fringe benefit of promotion. Now I __**know**__ for a fact that I'm dreaming. I'm back in Shiz, mumbling in my sleep and waiting for Elphaba to wake me up for the morning exam._ Glinda cringed, and tried to focus on the present.

"You said that emotions were among the privileges," she said hesitantly. "Is that why the soldiers that attacked the Emerald City were so... toneless?"

"Not entirely: our infantry are not given emotions, but they are given a minor Privilege in the form of the instinct to fight and kill. Should they perform their duties admirably, they will be rewarded with an emotion- usually that of anger or hatred; should they continue to perform their work with excellence, they will be promoted further, receiving more emotions as they-"

"I think I understand, now," Glinda interjected. "Thank you very much. There's just one more thing I'd like to know: where does the Nome King come into all this Privileges of Emotion business?"

As if in answer, there came the deafening clamour of stone grinding against stone from somewhere very nearby, and the sound of Nome voices (some with more emotions that others) shouting, "All Hail His Majesty The King!" And all of it, from the grinding to the exalting cries, was getting steadily closer. And then, as the attendant quietly withdrew, a figure began to form in the wall to Glinda's left- the Nome King, his form altered to fit inside the cell, but still undoubtedly the King.

Now that they were under a much more efficient light source, the King's features were easier to discern that they had been in the shadows of the square: the heavy brow, the intelligent stone eyes, the angular shape of the face, the long but well-trimmed beard, and above all, the smile. There was something remarkably mischievous about the way the King smiled, particularly when he turned to face Glinda, and his eyes appeared to glitter like quartz crystals.

"**Ah, Miss Glinda,"** he purred. **"I trust you're not finding your accommodations too squalid."**

"Let me guess," said Glinda, barely managing to keep her voice below a shout, "if I say that they're to my liking, you'll take away the mattress or something, and if I say that they're uncomfortable, you'll make them even worse."

The Nome King chuckled softly, and waved a hand. Glinda flinched, only to realise that the bolt of lightning that she'd been expecting hadn't struck her. Instead, a silver chair and table had risen from the floor: the table was laden with several platters of unfamiliar-looking foods, along with three large pewter goblets filled with a warm, bubbling liquid.

"What is this all about?"

"**I am told that it was the custom of Ozian businessmen to share a meal with their future business partners."**

This time, Glinda couldn't stop herself from shouting: "_Business partners?" _she shrieked. _"You just spent the better part of last night destroying the Emerald City, killing or petrifying its citizens in the process, stopped just short of killing me, AND NOW YOU HAVE THE GALL TO SUGGEST GOING INTO BUSINESS WITH ME?"_

"**I never said you had to accept my offer, Glinda," **said the King, gently. **"All I ask is that you listen to it, and if you don't find it to your liking, I'll leave you in peace. You don't have to actually like me for us to come to an agreement, do you?"**

"...No," Glinda admitted grudgingly.

"**Good, good. And don't look so bitter- have a drink, have something to eat. The pies are most suitable for humans, I am told."**

Temporarily swallowing her anger, Glinda reached down towards the nearest platter, picked up one of the small pies, and took a bite. To her surprise it actually tasted rather pleasant, if a little bit on the crunchy side. As she reached for another one, she found herself asking, "Why did you have to attack the Emerald City in the first place, anyway?"

"**Do you really need to know that **_**now?**_** It'll do you no good to operate under all this stress and frustration, you know."**

"Indulgify me a minute; It's pretty obvious that you took the Grimmerie for its magical power- pretty much the exact reason why _anyone_ would take the Grimmerie- but when your soldiers were first set loose in the Emerald City, I saw them stealing the emeralds from the buildings. Why were they so important? Why invade Oz for them?"

"**As a service to my people," **he replied. As Glinda took a heavy draught of her goblet, (the drink was both boiling hot and ridiculously sweet, if curiously metallic in colouration) the King explained the story of the emeralds, how the Wizard had convinced the previous king that he was due tribute as the omnipotent ruler of all Oz, and had demanded that tribute in the form of one of the Nome Kingdom's finest crop of emeralds- a mountain of gems so pure and so polished by magic that they were considered a cultural treasure by the Nomes.** "For years, my people longed to see them returned to us and the Ozians punished for their greed. Now, under my guidance, they have taken all due revenge: the human cities have been made to suffer, their king has been brought here to face the judgement of the War Council."**

"But the Scarecrow wasn't responsible for anything the Wizard did!"

"**I'm afraid that in the absence of the Wizard, my people are forced to take out their frustrations on a suitable scapegoat. Those of them capable of frustration, anyway. It's doubtful that the War Council will have the time to decide what to do with him, considering they're all busy conducting mop-up operations across Oz, so I wouldn't worry about it if I were you."**

"So, the question is, what do you want with _me?" _Glinda asked, unable to keep the apprehension out of her voice.

The King smiled benignly. **"What **_**I**_** want may not be as bad as you think. In fact, it quite neatly coincides with **_**you **_**want."**

"No offence," Glinda sneered, meaning every bit of offence she delivered, "But what could you possibly know about what I want?"

"**The same could be said of you, my dear."**

"Answer the question," she snapped, biting savagely into another of the pies, briefly fantasizing that she was biting the Nome King's head off.

The Nome King laughed. **"Glinda, I want you to picture, if you will, a network of Nome spies spread across Oz, watching the trader's carts rumbling down the Yellow Brick Road, listening to the words spoken by haughty nobles in their luxurious mansions. Can you grasp the implications?"**

She could; she could already feel the blood draining from her face as she let her imagination run wild. "How long have you been doing this?" she asked, as the half-eaten pie dropped from her hand and fell to the floor.

"**Many years, now... oh, my predecessors weren't above sending the odd spy to far-off lands to listen at the base of some castle for diplomatic gossip, but I was the first to send the spies out en mass, to organise them into an information-gathering force that covered all of Oz. And there was a great deal of information to gather and catalogue. For example, **"Ooh, the artichoke is steamed!" **and other sly put-downs by Galinda Upland, young socialite."**

Glinda's face flushed as she heard her own words repeated in exactly the same tone of voice she had used on the first day of university. She wasn't proud of those days, most of which had been spent surrounded by sympathetic hangers-on and giggling her way through schoolwork; she was even less proud of her treatment of Elphaba. In hindsight, it seemed that Glinda had never really developed a social conscience until she'd taken a good look at Elphaba's face at the Ozdust ballroom: standing there in her black dress and pointed hat, with almost the entire student body gawping at her, her expression hadn't been one of anger, hurt or confusion- but resignation, as if to say "Oh well, I should have expected something like this."

And after that inexplicable little dance they'd danced? Well, slowly but surely, the old "friendships" began to lose their appeal; slowly but surely, with a bit of encouragement from Elphaba, the homework began to seem a touch less difficult; slowly but surely, Animal Rights became a touch more important to her than before. And then, before she knew it, she was standing outside the gates of the Wizard's Palace, hand in hand with Elphaba, and a guard was booming "the Wizard will see you now!"

_But you didn't change fast enough, _she thought bitterly. _If you did, you would have supported her when she came up with the idea of rebelling._

The Nome King, noticing her stricken expression, continued in a far gentler tone of voice. **"For years, I studied the reports for events in Oz that we could benefit from- booms in the market, rebellious Animal activity, clients willing to pay for our clandestine services, that sort of thing. However, our spies would occasionally bring me word of you and Elphaba: it wasn't until I discovered that your friend had escaped the Emerald City with the Grimmerie that I started paying attention. Intrigued, I followed that little story until Kiamo Ko, the day you heard that your beloved Fiyero had died, the day you saw Elphaba melted... and the day that the Grimmerie passed to you. And you see, I believe I have a very good idea of what you desire more than anything else in the world."**

"What's the point?" snapped Glinda, her voice hoarse. "You couldn't possibly make my wish come true."

"**Couldn't I? In that case, just for the sake of argument, supposing I **_**could**_** send you back in time, where exactly would you want to be sent?"**

"Are you toying with me again?"

"**I'm trying to get down to business, Glinda. Now, if I could send you back to a point in time where you might be able to prevent Fiyero and Elphaba's untimely deaths, where would you go? Would you travel to sometime as recent as your little squabble in Munchkinland, or as early as the day you first met? Or perhaps somewhere more pivotal to your futures, like-"**

"The attic," said Glinda quietly. "The attic of the Wizard's palace. That was the point that decided everything, in the end- the one point where I could have made some kind of difference and I didn't. And believe me, I've had enough time to imagine what would have happened if I'd decided to help Elphaba, instead of staying behind as a figurehead- as a mouthpiece for every stupid, vacuous uplifting speech the Wizard wanted the people to hear. In the earlier days, I even tried to justificate my decision, I even told myself that I'd be giving up a good career, I wouldn't know what would happen to me if I'd decided to go with her, I would have just slowed her down, that ..."

She stopped, tears streaming quietly down her face. Then, she took a deep breath, and said, "All I'd have had to do was to get on the broomstick with Elphaba: I didn't. And because of that, because of _me,_ the Wizard had an even more convincicating figurehead to control the people of Oz with; because of me, Nessarose was murdered; because of me, Fiyero was tortured and killed; and because of me, Elphaba was melted. So, you have your answer: now, what was your point?"

"**I thought it was quite simple: I have the power to send you back in time, to give you that second chance you've been longing for."**

"And how would you do that?"

The Nome King told her.

Glinda's jaw dropped. "B-but... how did... I thought that th... How can they-"

"**Their creator was something of an overachiever when it came to enchantments... but then again, you already knew that."**

"But how did you even find them? I thought that-"

"**They fell out of the sky, Glinda: everything with the potential to bring great change seems to fall out of the sky these days."**

"So you can use them to send me back in time?"

The King laughed. **"Glinda,"** he chuckled triumphantly, **"There is absolutely nothing these artefacts **_**can't**_** do. With so much pure magical force contained within, their versatility, their sheer power is... well, **_**unlimited.**_** Just like their creator, really."**

"She didn't think so, towards the end," said Glinda sadly.

"**Well then, it's up to you to make sure doubt never enters her mind, isn't it?"**

There was a pause, as Glinda grappled with her own desire. "You told me that we were here to discuss business," she said eventually. "Just for the sake of argument, what would I have to do for you in return?" Her mind immediately conjured up every possible humiliation and torture that the Nome King could possibly inflict on her, followed swiftly by the horrible things he could make her do to the citizens of Oz; and then of course, a vision of herself soaked to the skin in blood and guts, wand in hand, assaulting a small cluster of chained prisoners with agonising blasts of energy as the Nome King applauded deafeningly on the fiery horizon.

Being prepared for the worst, she was understandably surprised when the King said, **"Nothing, if all goes well. However, if things go awry, I'll need your help with a matter involving the Grimmerie."**

"And what do you want to do with it?"

The Nome King explained; it took several minutes, and by the end of it, Glinda looked even more bewildered. "You're _serious?"_ she said incredulously.

"**Absolutely."**

"But I haven't even managed to get that far in studying the Grimmerie!"

"**Relax: you'll have all the time in the world... and better accommodations to study in- one of the luxury guest rooms, I should think. There, you will be given use of your magic again- under strict observation, of course- along with all the resources you will require. How does that sound?"**

Glinda said nothing.

"**It's a simple choice, Glinda: if my offer doesn't appeal to you, you can stay in captivity until the War Council finally decide what to do with you. I doubt that they'll have an execution in mind for you, so at the worst you'll face a life sentence, and at best, you'll be released... released back into Oz. But to be brutally honest, I don't think there's anything left for you there. The army has been very thorough in ensuring that almost every single major settlement from the Vinkus to Munchkinland is ruined. You might want to try and eke out a living amidst the chaos... or you could accept my offer, and return to a time when Elphaba, Fiyero, and Oz could have been saved."**

She wanted to tell him that she wasn't interested in collaborating with another dictator, that he had to be out of his mind if he thought that she'd join the services of the man who just destroyed Oz, that he should stick his head in a rock-crusher. But she couldn't bring herself to say anything.

"**I'm not the only one waiting for your answer, Glinda. **_**Elphaba **_**is waiting: she wants to know if you'll join her; she has the broomstick ready, even now. Don't you want to see your friend again? Don't you want to be as brave as her, as courageous as her? Don't you want to throw away the pathetic half-life that the Wizard offers? She awaits your answer, Glinda... but she won't wait forever."**

Glinda opened her mouth to tell the King to get stuffed, but what escaped was a strangled whimper of "I accept."

The King _grinned, _showing jagged, rocky teeth. **"Good, good," **he purred.** "I knew you would see reason. A toast!" **he proclaimed suddenly, seizing his goblet. **"To New Friends!"**

With arms that felt as though they had been made of lead, Glinda wearily lifted her own goblet, mumbled a reply, and drank heavily. It wasn't until she'd almost finished drinking that she realised that the reply she'd mumbled was, "To Old Friends."

"**Well now," **said the King happily, **"Why don't I escort you to your chamber? I'm sure you'll want some time to yourself after this decision, and perhaps a bit of relaxation..."**

He waved a hand, and the entire front wall of the cell thundered aside, revealing a freshly-built corridor, leading away into the darkness of the palace's lower floors. As the "door" finished opening, there was a rumble from the remaining unoccupied wall as the attendant reappeared, shifting its whole body out of the stone as it went; it immediately dropped to its knees before the King, and intoned, "Please forgive the intrusion, Your Majesty, but the generals of the War Council have requested that I keep the prisoner in this cell until they return."

The King eyed the attendant dubiously. **"And does the word of a general outweigh the word of the King?" **he said, voice dangerously calm.

"No, Your Majesty; I merely state my duty to keep the prisoner under guard."

"**Very commendable. In that case, you shall continue guarding Miss Glinda once she is relocated to the guest rooms: you are hereby promoted to the station of Bodyguard, and given the Privilege of a Name. Congratulations."**

The attendant-turned-bodyguard blinked. "But what shall be my name, Your Majesty?"

The King rolled his eyes. **"Perhaps Miss Glinda can decide on that. Now, you have a room to escort her to..."**

As the Bodyguard ushered Glinda hurriedly down the corridor, Glinda tried, belatedly, to try and feel the slightest bit of regret over the decision she'd just made; but there was no regret, in the end. The moment she had uttered the words "I accept," she'd lost sight of that particular emotion. All she felt now was mild surprise that she'd managed to make such a decision, a colossal sense of weariness, and last but certainly not least, the familiar yearning to see Elphaba again- amplified a thousandfold now that the chance might very well be within reach.

_It'll all be worth it in the end, _she thought._ If I can make sure she doesn't face the Wizard's forces alone, if I can stop it from ending the way it did, it'll be worth everything. Every sacrifice, every compromise, every humiliation... __**Elphaba**__ is worth it._


	9. Remnants

A/N: Before this latest chapter begins, I'd just like to thank everyone who's reviewed so far, especially Nirky: I honestly didn't expect to find such a detailed review for one of my stories. I hope you enjoy the chapters that follow, and I hope that I can build a fitting conclusion to Glinda's half of the plot. So, without further ado, here we have the latest chapter: read and review, ladies and gents! Constructive criticism is, as always, welcome!

PS: I don't own Wicked or Oz. Etc, etc...

* * *

Had there been any Ozians watching the skies above the lands of Oz in the early hours of that morning, they would have been witnesses to the return of a woman thought dead for over a year.

They would have undoubtedly been surprised at the lack of fanfare, at the mysterious absence of maniacal laughter, magical attacks, or murderous slogans written across the sky in fiery letters. And they probably would have wondered why she was frantically scanning the ground with a handheld beam of light, and what she could possibly be looking for.

Some of them might have even speculated that she was to blame for the events of the previous evening, or that she might have allied with the invaders.

But they didn't: no citizen of Oz had the time to watch the skies that morning; they were either too busy worrying about more immediate problems, or already dead.

But there _were_ a few foreigners watching the skies that dark morning, but they had already been warned of her approach, and they were content to watch... and report.

* * *

Elphaba watched in horror as the ruined landscape unfolded beneath her, her light spell piercing the early-morning darkness all too easily; even moving as fast as she was, she couldn't help but see the devastation that the invaders had wreaked upon the country: acre after acre of farmland incinerated, wooden houses smashed to matchsticks, stone houses torn apart, machinery crushed and flattened into scrap metal. If any Ozians had survived the carnage, they'd almost certainly fled for their lives without looking back or attempting to retrieve anything from the wreckage.

Worst of all, in most of the ruined settlements that she flew over there was a large bonfire in what had once been the town square. Elphaba didn't have to catch the smell of cooking meat to realise that the Nomes had been _very_ orderly in disposing of the bodies of anyone brave enough to try and fight them.

How many had been killed last night? Thousands? Millions? How many had escaped? Would they be organised enough to try and fight back? Would the Nomes hunt them down and destroy them?

She gritted her teeth and tried to concentrate on the task at hand, but her mind kept drifting back to the neatly-stacked corpses, all ablaze and all filling the air with the smell of burnt flesh and ashes. One in particular stuck in her memory- a vision of one man, freshly-dead from horrific burns, lying face down on the cobblestones just a few metres from the bonfire. Immediately after seeing it, her imagination had told her everything she hadn't wanted to know- that the Nomes hadn't noticed or cared that the man wasn't dead when they started burning the bodies...

Just as she was beginning to feel as though she was about to vomit, Elphaba finally saw something below that distracted her from the bonfires: it was the Yellow Brick Road, uprooted by what could only be the burrowing Nome army and reduced to a scattered trail of broken yellow bricks.

Broken, just like the rest of Oz.

And at the end of the road, stripped of its famous emeralds, lay the ruins of the once-great Emerald City; even though it looked far better seen from above and in the morning, even though the fires had long since died, it was still a ghastly sight- almost skeletal, as if the city was the corpse of some gigantic creature, picked clean by swarming insects and trampled by careless feet. Elphaba shuddered, and tried to clear her head of her morbid thoughts; the last thing she wanted to do was crash the broom while distracted.

But in truth, there was so much to distract her, from the merest sight of the desecrated city and the statues that its people had been reduced to, to the mysterious and curiously nerve-eroding sound of squeaking wheels that would occasionally echo from beneath its crumbling bridges and archways. And, of course, it didn't take long for her to smell the all-too distinctive melange of ashes, blood, and charred flesh.

_The first time I came here,_ Elphaba thought, as she began descending towards one of the few streets that wasn't strewn with rubble or crowded with petrified citizens, _it was because of Madame Morrible. And here I am all over again, at Morrible's behest, finding something even worse than the Wizard. _She shook her head and finally brought the broomstick to a halt on the cratered pathway.

As she clambered off, she heard the sound of squeaking wheels in the distance yet again, and looked up just in time to see a vaguely humanoid figure scurrying out of sight- not walking, but _rolling._ She remembered Madame Morrible's delirious explanation of Mombi's private army, and frowned: back in the garden, the Wheelers hadn't seemed too much of a threat, but now that she was standing in ruins of the city that they had helped conquer, the idea of a drug-crazed harlequin with wheels for hands and feet didn't seem quite as silly.

Elphaba briefly contemplated getting back on her broom and trying to find whatever tunnel that the Nomes had used to get into the city from. But she knew she wouldn't- and almost certainly _couldn't-_ take that shortcut: she had to see what the Nomes had done to the Emerald City first. So, taking a deep breath, she began marching down the street towards the remains of the palace, all the while noticing how unnaturally loud her footsteps sounded.

With so many of the main roads blocked by crowds of petrified citizens, it didn't take her too long to start inspecting the statues closely, hoping to find some way of dispelling the petrifaction (and trying not to look too closely at the expressions of horror frozen on their faces). Unfortunately, after experimenting with numerous spells, Elphaba found that whatever curse had been placed upon the citizens, it couldn't be so easily remedied.

At that point, she would have been more than happy to get back on her broom and fly over the blocked thoroughfare, had a shape perched on one of the higher ledges of a nearby building not caught her eye: it was another petrified victim of the invasion, but curiously enough, this one hadn't been trying to flee when the spell had caught up with him; his right arm was flung outwards, as if he'd been throwing something, and his wings were...

Her mind processed the word "wings," and she suddenly recognised who and what the figure was; even at a distance, even with his features turned to marble, there was no mistaking him.

_Chistery. Oh Gods, _no_..._

Chistery, unofficial leader of the flying monkeys, stared at the ground, his face frozen in one last grimace of effort; whatever his gaze had been fixed upon was long gone, leaving only a shallow crater.

Elphaba took a tentative step towards him, and something crunched under her foot; she looked down and realised with horror that she had trodden on the petrified remains of one of the other flying monkeys: this one must have been in flight when the spell hit, because it had been smashed to gravel upon the paving-stones. The pieces were large enough to be recognisable as part of a flying monkey, though; apparently, it was the part of the left wing that Elphaba had accidentally crushed.

Horror-struck, she scanned the paving-stones around her and found the eight or nine monkeys in more or less the same condition; their last expressions- eyes open wide in shock, mouths frozen in silent screams- told Elphaba that these had been petrified in flight as well, and had a chance to realise what was happening before their flesh had completely turned to stone. Scarcely able to breathe, Elphaba stared across the broken skyline, hoping to find those that had managed to land in time; it took her several minutes of alternatively looking around and running through the deserted streets, but thank goodness, there _were_ several monkeys perched upon ledges or clinging to outcroppings like gargoyles.

At long last, she breathed again, and sat down heavily on a toppled column. _How could this have happened? _She thought, her thoughts wheeling and buzzing about her head like flies. _Who could have had the magical power to do... _this_ to the population of an entire city? Do the Nomes really have this much power at hand? If they do, why haven't they used it before? _She massaged her temples: so many questions with no answers in sight.

For a time, Elphaba wandered aimlessly, her mind buzzing with thought, her senses absorbing every atrocity and feeding the information back into her brain, where it was examined, catalogued and filed away. This wasn't quite like when she'd thought that Fiyero had been tortured to death: here, there was no all-consuming rage, no heartrending sorrow, just cold, mechanical analysis. On some level, she realised that she wasn't thinking straight, that she seemed to have lost sight of her emotion, but it took almost half an hour for her to come to her senses.

When she did, she found herself standing in front of another group of petrified victims; however, as emotion and comprehension gradually filtered back into her mind, she recognised the two as the Cowardly Lion and the Tin Man- AKA Boq.

They'd obviously been in the middle a battle when the petrifaction spell hit them, because the Tin Man's axe was raised high above his head, ready to strike a killing blow. However, someone had carved the word _Biq_ into his chest some time afterwards; Elphaba frowned, recognising Glinda's familiar mangling of Boq's name. Who had defaced him, and how had this person known so much about his past? More importantly, why had this person even bothered? It wasn't as if he'd know about the graffiti or anything-

Elphaba paused: something was very different about this particular petrifaction; she could sense it in the very substance of the magic that had imprisoned him. Something about it was _incomplete_; she studied the petrified figure for a moment, trying to determine what it was.

And then it hit her: Boq was still conscious, and very much aware of what was going on around him.

A mixture of pity and horror filled her. Admittedly, Elphaba had always had mixed feelings about Boq: at Shiz, she'd found him an obsequious little tagalong, but she'd found grudging admiration for his persistence; she'd felt sorry for him when she found him being forced to work for Nessarose, but she'd also felt contempt for his failure to stand up to anyone- least of all his employer; and when he'd rallied the witch-hunters against her, when he'd joined Dorothy and her companions, her opinion of him had only worsened, though she knew that, directly and indirectly, she'd been responsible for his transformation.

Then again, this was something she wouldn't have wished on her worst enemy, let alone someone like Boq.

She'd heard about Boq's problems with rust from Fiyero; was this anything like that? Or was it even worse? It certainly sounded as such. After all, he had to be aware of the graffiti on his chest, of the chaos and destruction that had occurred all around him the previous evening.

An idea struck her, and she began rummaging around in her bag of magical items: eventually, she found the notebook-sized spellbook, and rifled through it for a few seconds before she found the chapter she needed. Communicating with Boq on any level at this stage would be almost impossible without magic, and the means of actually doing so were still remarkably limited, but querying Boq was one of her only leads in finding where the Nomes had gone; beyond questioning the dreaded Mombi or trying to find a map of the Nome Dominions in the incinerated remains of the Emerald City's libraries, she was out of ideas.

The spellbook she'd brought out was largely comprised of minor spells created for use in times of war many centuries ago, which was probably the reason why Elphaba had found it half-buried in the dunes of the Deadly Desert. Whatever the case, though, the one she was about to use had been intended for use in questioning individuals that were conscious but incapable of speech- the mute, the mortally-wounded, and the psychically relocated.

She read the instructions carefully, laid the book open on the ground in front of her, and began to chant softly, slowly gathering her willpower and concentrating it into her breath; then, the chant finished, she exhaled into one hand, and clasped it over Boq's stone forehead.

Then, she asked, "Boq, can you hear me?"

Nothing happened; apparently, the spell was having trouble connecting with Boq's brain, which was somewhat understandable considering the state it was probably in by now.

She tried again: "Boq, if you can hear me, I'm looking for Glinda and the Scarecrow; from what little I've heard, they've been captured, and I've very little idea where they've been taken. While you were petrified, did you see or hear anything about them, or where the Nomes were going?"

Still nothing. Elphaba took a deep breath, and gave it one more try: "Boq, you need to answer me if you can: Glinda's life may depend on this!"

* * *

His despair had long since given away to curiosity... and other strange and unfamiliar feelings.

Boq had experienced many periods of rust and corrosion that had left him almost completely paralysed; these had been torturous, to say the least, but this was different. There was no sense that his body was somehow beginning to succumb to the elements, no dull whirring in limbs that yearned to move again, just stillness. It was curiously peaceful, but at the same time, just as bad as all the other times where he'd spent the days after a rainstorm frozen in mid-step.

In some ways it was worse; quite apart from the burning humiliation of having _That Name_ burnt into his chest and being forced to listen as the Wheelers shrilled it gleefully at him, something about the petrifaction was beginning to affect his mind. Maybe it was part of whatever mistake Mombi had made; maybe it was just the normal effect of the spell on a conscious brain. Either way, his perception of time had slowed to a crawl, but at times, it would roar past him at a furious rate, so that he found himself amazed that the passing Wheelers didn't leave fiery trails in the pavement. Colours slowly dimmed in and out of existence, grey stone suddenly turning blindingly white, the vivid red and silver costumes worn by the Wheelers fading into black and grey. The low howl of the wind through the ruined buildings began to sound like a musical instrument, and sometime he would see the musician sitting upon a broken wall, piping mournfully.

Sometimes these sensations distressed him; sometimes they fascinated him; sometimes he could ignore them altogether and comfort himself with the idea that somehow, Glinda had recovered the Grimmerie and had escaped. Perhaps she was rallying the people of Oz even now, calling for them to take back the Emerald City from the invaders.

Yes, he was feeling nicely euphoric right about now.

As Boq wondered at nothing, a new hallucination appeared on the periphery of his senses: a voice, calling out "Boq, you need to answer me if you can: Glinda's life may depend on this!"

The voice sounded familiar, but then again, given the amount of voices he had heard in the past few hours (or had it been days? Weeks? Months? Years? Time made no sense anymore) it could be anyone. And how was he supposed to speak to anyone? He was petrified!

And then, as if by magic, he felt his larynx whirr to life. For several seconds, he gabbled wildly, trying to introduce himself, trying to ask who the voice was. In turn, the voice tried to calm him down, telling him that Glinda's life might depend on him answering; this galvanised him into action. "She was heading towards the palace!" he said excitedly. "She was going to retrieve the Grimmerie!"

As he spoke, he noticed the source of the voice at long last: though he couldn't be sure, it looked like a tall, blurring shadow against the opposite wall. Or was it just a smudge on his eyeball? He couldn't tell. The shadow was still asking questions: "But do you know where the Nomes might have taken her and the Scarecrow? Did you see them leaving? Did they leave tunnels or anything like that?"

"Oh no, no," said Boq, very happy to be indulging this hallucination. "The tunnels vanished behind them. I don't think I can be much help of you... but you could look in the palace if you like. Perhaps Mombi could tell you something. Maybe Glinda left clues."

There was an embarrassed pause. "Boq, you _do_ know I'm being serious about this, right?"

"Of course!" said Boq, and laughed- maybe a little longer than necessary, but there was obviously something very funny about it.

When the shadow spoke again, the voice sounded almost despairing: "Do you recognise me?"

Boq tried to shake his head, but couldn't for obvious reasons. Eventually, he said, "No. Do I know you?" he asked innocently. "Are we friends?"

The shadow sighed deeply. "Thanks for your help, Boq. If it's alright by you, I'd like to help you in return..."

* * *

Five minutes later, Boq was sinking into the strongest enchanted sleep that Elphaba could conjure.

Five minutes later, Elphaba was flying towards the palace, deeply shaken.

* * *

"Empress Mombi! Empress Mombi! There's been-"

Mombi's sceptre hammered into the side of the Wheeler's head, toppling him to the ground. "I told you," she yelled, "My title is _Princess _Mombi, now! I told you and your idiot brethren scant hours ago- how many times do I have to repeat it?"

"But Empr..." The Wheeler, who was now trying to upright himself, realised what he was saying, and hurriedly backtracked: "But Princess Mombi, there's a-"

"I will not tolerate disrespect from my subordinates!" Mombi bellowed. "You will obey my commands without question or so help me I will rip your intestines out and _strangle you with them!_ Now tell me, _WHAT_ were you going to tell me before you showed such a grievous breach of etiquette?"

"Well, Princess Mombi," said the Wheeler, hauling himself awkwardly upright, "There's an intruder in the city."

"So what? Tear the impudent wretch to pieces as you'd do to any intruder that dares to set foot in my city!"

"But this one's different, Princess Mombi- she has magic."

Mombi's eyes narrowed. "Does the intruder have green skin?"

"Yes, yes, green skin and black cloak and broomstick and-"

"That's enough. Now, where was this particular intruder going?"

"She was flying in this very direction the last we saw her, Princess Mombi. We could surround her and tear her to pieces if you wish-"

"_No!"_ Mombi snapped. "The Nome King wants this intruder alive. I'll deal with her myself, and _you will not interfere; _you are to make sure that your drug-addled brothers and sisters do the same. Now leave, while I prepare myself!"

There was a pause, as the Wheeler scurried away, giggling nervously; as soon as she was certain that she was alone, Mombi stood at long last, resplendent in her blood-red robes, and strode across the ballroom-turned-throne room towards the adjoining gallery. "I think," she said contemplatively, over the horrified gasps from within, "That #13 would make the perfect first impression..."

* * *

As expected, the doors to the palace were locked and barred; it would have been relatively simple to blast them off their hinges, but Elphaba didn't want to risk alerting Mombi. But then again, that was assuming that Mombi didn't already know that she was there.

The last time she'd been here, the last time she'd actually been _inside _the palace, it had been her second meeting with the Wizard; that time, it had been in the middle of the night, and most of the Wizard's entourage had been too engaged in dancing the night away to notice her climbing in through an upstairs window. Of course, the Wizard had been expecting her, but then, the worst he'd done was make her jump fifty feet in the air by booming "I KNEW YOU'D BE BACK" at her and call the guards when she refused his offer. If _Mombi_ was expecting her, the results would probably be deadlier by far, and if Morrible's warning was to be believed, eternal.

Unfortunately, it looked as though all that was currently moot, because Mombi had reinforced most of the windows with bars, and sealed any doorways on the balconies. Even the entrance to the now-collapsed tower had been bricked up.

Muttering coarsely, Elphaba was readying a spell to blast away the new mortar, when she heard the sound of the front doors opening and slamming shut far below; she looked down just in time to catch the garishly-dressed figure of a Wheeler skating off into the ruins. Elphaba waited until he was well and truly out of sight before soaring back down to ground level and trying to open the doors again; immediately, she found that the doors had been almost automatically locked and barred. This Mombi character certainly wasn't taking too many chances with security.

And then she saw something protruding from the piles of rubble that had once composed the tower; curious, and hoping it might be something useful, Elphaba approached it, and began hauling away the fallen masonry that covered it. As more and more of the object was exposed to the air, she realised that it was an elegantly-carved marble pedestal, chipped and cracked in the fall from the collapsing tower, but very much intact. It also appeared to be enchanted for some reason, but she wasn't sure what effect it was mean to produce.

And then, as the last brick was hauled off it, the magic in the pedestal crackled back to life, producing the spectral image of a face; as letters began to appear beneath the monochrome image, Elphaba realised that this must be some kind of shrine or memorial, and wondered who it was meant to commemorate. And then colour began to bloom across the surface of the image; for three whole seconds, Elphaba thought she was looking into a mirror. Then her eyes flicked to the words below the image, and suddenly there could be no doubting who this shrine had been built for:

IN LOVING MEMORY OF ELPHABA THROPP

"Some are born wicked; others have wickedness thrust upon them."

And given that these words, the image, and perhaps even the pedestal had been crafted with magic, there was only one person in all of Emerald City who could have possibly had the ability and the inclination to make them. How long had Glinda slaved away at this, slicing through marble with her wand, shaping words out of light and conjuring the image from her memory? Had it been over the course of a week, or had she finished the work in a single day of cathartic work? And what frustrations, what sadness had driven her to produce it at all?

Elphaba remembered their last meeting at Kiamo Ko; in between the tears, in between the farewells, she'd told Glinda not to tell the people of Oz the truth, to ensure that she never told them her story- lest she end up just as demonized as Elphaba had been. But what if Glinda _had_ tried to tell at least part of the story... and met with an audience that simply hadn't wanted to listen?

_So, Elphie, _she thought to herself, _was it worth it? Was your escape from Oz worth trapping Glinda in leadership? Was deposing the Wizard worth forcing your best friend to lie for him? Was your happy little home outside of Oz worth everything she_ _suffered? Was any of it worth _anything, _now that the Nomes have all brought it crashing down?_

She was crying, now; the world blurred and swayed around her as Elphaba tried to look away from the shrine, to try and ignore the guilt for at least a little while, but she couldn't. It was alive now, and gnawing greedily at her heart. Her memories lurched and spun inside her mind, and without warning, she was back in Kiamo Ko, howling despairingly at the pages of the Grimmerie and cursing herself for her failures, as her magic blazed wildly throughout the castle and across the surrounding land. Now, back in the present, she cursed herself for betrayal and closed her eyes so tightly that sparks blazed in the darkness behind her eyelids.

Somewhere inside her, a soothing voice whispered, _You know you didn't have any choice in the matter; it was either convince Glinda and the rest of Oz that you had died, or carry on with the reign of terror. This way, you gave them a leader worth following. And true, it didn't last, but that's what you're here to change, isn't it?_

Elphaba didn't like listening to this particular soothing voice- it reminded her of the Wizard- but that didn't stop it from being frustratingly helpful. She _could_ believe what they said- at least for a little while; she could lie to herself for as long as it took to save Glinda and Fiyero... and then-

Someone was standing behind her.

"Well well well," a voice crooned. "Who would have thought that the Wicked Witch could be capable of shedding tears? And over her own memorial, no less! What an ego!"

Hurriedly drying her eyes on the hem of her cloak, Elphaba -rose to her feet and turned to face the stranger, her eyes skimming briefly over the red silk robes, the golden collar, the long, skinny arms encased in golden bracelets, the bejewelled fingers. However, Elphaba quickly remembered the description of Mombi that Morrible had provided her with, and knew at once that this person didn't match it: this woman looked as though she'd just sauntered out of a ballroom, her skin ivory pale, her long dark hair bound by several golden clasps, icy blue eyes accentuated with makeup.

The stranger glared down at her. "You're a lot prettier than the rumours suggested... but clearly unsuitable for my purposes. Besides, I try to avoid collecting from those skilled in magic."

Elphaba stared. Had Morrible got the description wrong? Could this be Mombi?

Her eyes alighted on the golden collar that the stranger wore around her neck; was it just an affectation, or was she wearing it for a practical purpose? Could she be wearing it to hide something? Elphaba looked closer at the edges of the collar, and realised that the skin below it didn't _quite_ match the skin above the collar. More to the point, both were speckled with tiny but telltale bloodstains.

Suddenly, the tales of Mombi's head-taking seemed even more grotesque.

"So," said Elphaba flatly, "You're Mombi, right?"

"Lucky guess," Mombi sneered.

"Where's your original head? Sitting on a shelf next to all the others you collected?"

"And how did you find out _that?"_

"Madame Morrible was kind enough to tell me everything she could about you."

A ghastly smile spread across Mombi's face. "Ah," she said, "Horrible Morrible; I heard the fussy old baggage taught you as well, before she gave up on teaching of course. How is she, anyway?"

"She's dead," said Elphaba, solemnly.

Mombi shrugged. "Good riddance to bad rubbish, I suppose. But back to my favourite subject: the collection of heads. It's just a shame that I couldn't collect Glinda's head, you know. I think I would have worn it very well indee-"

Elphaba's first blast of magic caught Mombi just under the chin, sending her rocketing back across the rubble-strewn ground; as she tumbled through the air, the second blast of magic caught her in the throat, snapping the her collar open, letting her head fly free of her body- and land right in Elphaba's waiting hands.

"Now," said Elphaba, "It just so happens that I need to know where Glinda is right now, and you're the only person in this city who might have a decent idea. Now tell me- _where did the Nomes take Glinda and the Scarecrow?"_

"Or what?" the head expectorated. "You're not threatening my real head, remember?"

"That doesn't mean that stomping it to paste won't hurt, though, will it? And it certainly doesn't keep me from finding and destroying your original head and the rest of your collection, does it? Now talk!"

A fireball shot over them and exploded noisily against a distant wall; Elphaba looked up just in time to see Mombi's headless body preparing another fireball. It might have been just about impossible for the head-swapping Witch to see where she was firing, but there was no denying that she had just enough talent to be seriously dangerous.

Mombi's head smirked. "That was a warning shot; the next one will be aimed at your face. So, let's negotiate, shall we? You give my head back to my body, and I'll tell you what you want to know."

"Oh, it's _your _head, is it?" Elphaba snarled indignantly. "How about I make a counteroffer at this stage:_ y_ou tell me where the Nomes went, and _then_ I'll hand the head over... or else I'll use it as a football!"

The head's eyes suddenly crackled with lightning. "You wouldn't have the time; I'd liquify your brains first."

"Try me."

The expression on the head flickered between fear and anger for a few seconds. "Very well," it said grudgingly. "The Dominions of the Nomes lie far beyond Oz, far to the East. Because they live underground, they're not easy to find unless you know the right landmark- and that landmark is something you can't possibly miss: the Nome King's Mountain. You'll recognise it by the two pinnacles at the top of it, like horns..."

Elphaba listened carefully as Mombi detailed the route towards the Nome King's mountain. Eventually, Mombi grumbled, "I've told you everything I know. Can you give the head back, now?"

Elphaba nodded, and held out the head towards the outstretched arms of Mombi's body...

Then she threw it into the air.

By the time Mombi had retrieved the head and fastened it back on her neck, Elphaba was long gone.

"The things I do for this job," Mombi grumbled.

* * *

"Your Majesty, the witch has just been seen leaving the Emerald City, heading east."

"**Very good... it would appear that Mombi still retains some awkward comprehension of her duties; of course, wether she still has the capacity to obey her other orders is yet to be seen. Keep me informed of Elphaba's progress."**

"As you wish, Your Majesty."

"**And ensure that our spies along the mountainside recognise her on sight. After all, I would prefer it if we were ready to provide all due hospitality to our newest ally..."**


	10. New Lodgings

A/N: Here we are: Chapter 10 at long last! I hope the plot's moving coherently enough so far, and I hope you enjoy! So, read and review ladies and gentlemen, and as always, constructive criticism is welcome!

Disclaimer: I do not own Wicked or Oz, and never will, etc...

* * *

Glinda was just about ready to collapse by the time she and her bodyguard had arrived at her new room: quite apart from the long walk from the dungeons to the guest chambers, she was still feeling battered and worn out from the previous evening's fighting. The fact that the only sleep she'd had since then had been magically-induced didn't help much.

All she wanted to do at that stage was to lie in bed, with the covers pulled as far over her head as they could go, and forget that the last few days had ever happened. And when she saw the luxurious apartment that the Nomes had prepared for her, the desire for sleep became almost overpowering: everything in the room had been selected for comfort, from the enormous four-poster bed to the ridiculously cushioned chair. Even the carpet looked thick enough to sleep on.

There were only two things stopping her from climbing into bed and dozing off at that moment: the first was the question of where the Nomes had gotten the furniture from. From what little she'd seen of them, the Nomes didn't seem to require much in the way of creature comforts, and if they did, it didn't seem likely that said comforts would match the average Ozians. So, either they'd simply purchased them through perfectly legitimate trade, or Glinda was honestly entertaining the idea of sleeping in a bed that had been looted by the Nome invaders. _Probably dragged out of the house while the owner was bleeding his last on the ground outside,_ she thought wretchedly.

The other thing keeping her awake at that point was the question of where the Nomes had taken the Grimmerie; but as Glinda looked across the room, she found it sitting on the mahogany desk across from the bed. A scrap of parchment had been left on the cover, presumably for her to find; all it read was _"Good luck in your studies."_ Glinda sighed, sat down heavily in the chair with the Grimmerie open in her lap, and wondered where or how she was supposed to begin.

She'd heard the Nome King's request: it was utterly insane, and more to the point, she likely wouldn't even be the first in line to make his wish come true. She was an understudy, emergency backup, a safety net in place to make sure that the whole plan didn't go tumbling to its doom the moment the first option failed... whatever the first option was, anyway. But what if she _was_ to carry out the final stage in his plan? Would she have learned all she'd need to know by then? She'd certainly have to step up her studies and work like mad if she ever hoped to make the deadline.

_It'll be worth it,_ she told herself, _it'll be worth it._

From behind her, there emerged a strange rumbling sound; she turned in her seat, and realised that it was the Bodyguard gently clearing his throat: "If you would pardon the interruption, Miss Glinda... His Majesty the King entrusted you with the duty of bestowing a name upon me."

Glinda sighed deeply; she didn't want to shout at him, even if he was becoming annoying, even if he was a representative of the King who'd just obliterated the capital of Oz and was carrying out the wholesale destruction of the rest of the country, even if she just wanted to close her eyes and sleep for a hundred years without this stone flunky bleating for favours...

Her annoyance must have shown on her face, because the Bodyguard immediately bowed his head as if in contrition, and said, "If you do not wish to do so immediately, it can be postponed until later..."

"No, it's okay. It's just..." Glinda tried to prioritize all the problems that were facing her at that moment, and eventually settled on, "I don't know any Nome names."

"It does not matter, Miss Glinda. Any name bestowed by authority is good enough."

Glinda thought on this for a moment. It seemed at first that naming this strange character would be the least difficult thing on her growing to-do list, but on closer inspection, it was something of a puzzle. She obviously couldn't just give him any old Ozian name, and giving him the name of a friend would be just plain inappropriate. So, that left descriptive names: what name would adequately describe the Bodyguard?

The word "Bland" swam temptingly through her imagination, and she almost smiled. What could describe him apart from that, though? He wasn't quite as tall as the Nome soldiers, and his build was downright spindly compared to them, but other than that, he wasn't much different from them. What name would work?

With tiredness setting in and running low on ideas, Glinda's mind picked a word out of her memory at random: she didn't know where she'd heard it- maybe it had been at school, maybe it had been overheard on a train somewhere- but she knew it had something to do with stone or rock.

"How about Basalt?" she suggested.

"Basalt," said the Bodyguard, rolling the word in his mouth. "If that is the name you choose to bestow upon me, then I accept it. Thank you, Miss Glinda. Eternal thanks are due." Somehow, the newly-christened Basalt managed to convey gratitude in an otherwise toneless voice.

Glinda's eyelids fluttered; too much had happened in the last twenty-four hours: she'd helped her successor take the throne, she'd been hurled out of a tower, she'd seen the Emerald City fall to an army of stone men, she'd duelled their King and been captured in loosing, she'd been subjected to all manner of strange and terrible revelations, and now that she'd given a name to an emotionless bodyguard, all she wanted was a few hours of natural, uninterrupted sleep before she went back to trying to do the impossible.

She turned to Basalt, who was now asking her if there was anything she needed. "I'd like some time alone before I get to work," she said wearily.

"As you wish, Miss Glinda. Should you require any assistance, simply call my name." And with that, Basalt vanished into the back wall of the room, leaving Glinda alone in her private suite.

_Somehow, _she thought to herself, _I get the feeling that the situation can only get worse from here. But it's all worth it. It's all worth it..._

Glinda was still thinking these words when she fell asleep in her chair less than a minute and a half later.

* * *

Flying high above what had once been the Land of Oz, Elphaba found herself wondering if Mombi had confessed a little too easily. After all, with the rest of her repulsive "collection" (along with her original head) in danger, wouldn't someone of Mombi's temperament put up more of a fight?

And even more worryingly, Mombi hadn't been too surprised to see Elphaba alive; either Mombi just didn't care that much- which certainly seemed possible- or someone had _told _her that Elphaba's death had been faked.

But who would have told her? The only person still alive to tell was-

_Fiyero_.

Fiyero couldn't feel pain anymore, so he certainly wouldn't have said anything if the Nomes had tortured him. But Elphaba had heard of certain esoteric forms of magic that could easily uncover a living being's deepest, darkest secrets, spells that could tear the memories from Fiyero's head and print them on paper- spells that, for all Elphaba knew, the Nome interrogators had in their repertoire. Perhaps, while searching for the kind of state secrets that only the King of Oz would know, the Nomes had accidentally unearthed the truth behind Elphaba's apparent death. So, knowing that she'd eventually try to rescue him, they'd warned Mombi.

In other words, Elphaba was almost certainly heading into a trap.

_But what choice do I have? _She thought, her psyche bubbling like a cauldron. _I can't just leave Fiyero and Glinda in captivity. And besides, what's the alternative? Fly home, try to forget that the Nomes are sweeping across the country, and hope that they don't have me assassinated as a threat to their plans?_

She smothered an expletive, and tried to focus her attention on the charred countryside below; she was over Munchkinland now, and she had several hundred miles to fly before she came anywhere near the Nome Dominions. _Then again, _Elphaba thought darkly, _the way these Nomes are claiming territory_, _I'll be in the Nome Dominions before I leave Oz._

Oddly enough, she'd only caught occasional glimpses of the Nomes on her journey so far, most of them as they were leaving the overturned cities, having finished demolishing the houses and burning the bodies. Every so often, she'd see one or two of them hauling away piles of stolen goods: jewellery, ornaments, furniture, whole libraries of books; all of them dragged away as the departing Nomes burrowed back underground. But whatever they were doing, for whatever reason, they always left... usually just as Elphaba was considering flying down and attacking them.

But there were stranger sights to be seen here, though: unexpectedly, there was a house left intact close to the centre of one of the Munchkin towns. And though it was more or less in one piece, it _was_ somewhat dilapidated. In fact, as Elphaba slowed slightly, she realised that it didn't even have foundations; it was as if someone had just dropped it there.

And someone _had_, she realised, bringing the broom to a halt; this was the house that Dorothy Gale had arrived in, the house that had crushed Nessarose to death. It was quite obvious why the Munchkins hadn't been interested in moving the house, but why had the Nomes let it be?

Suffocating both her sadness and the unwanted question, Elphaba moved on. As she ascended, she realised that discovery had done her an unexpected favour, for with most of the cities rendered unrecognisable by the invasion, navigating Oz had become somewhat difficult without the aid of a map; now, she had some idea how far she was from the border.

From here on, what was left of the farmland was broken up by an extremely long stretch of forest. Strange; as far as Elphaba could remember, this had once been an orchard of lunchpail trees. But somehow, in the year since Elphaba had last visited, this modest-sized orchard had grown into a forest large enough to cover the next few acres of land. Was this a side-effect of the Nome Invasion? It didn't seem extraordinarily likely, but there weren't too many alternative explanations in store.

As she passed over it, she thought she heard the sound of shouted voices from below; she remembered how she'd seen no people in her journey so far. Perhaps Munchkin refugees were hiding here; it sounded feasible: after all, the Nomes didn't seem to have much interest in destroying Oz's forests. Perhaps the forests of Oz were now becoming havens for fleeing Ozians.

Unfortunately, this meant that, after perhaps seven hours without encountering a single living soul, she was now flying over a group of doubtlessly panicked survivors. And if they were still armed with something that could reach her, that meant-

There was a _bang_ from below.

_So, _she thought, _they still have guns. They obviously didn't do much good against the Nomes, and at the height I'm flying at, they're not much good against me either. _She recalled the first time she'd taken flight, when a few guards on the outer walls of the Emerald City had had the presence of mind to actually fire their guns: every single shot they'd fired had missed her then, as well. _How little things change._

There were a few other scattered gunshots from below before the forest was plunged back into silence, presumably as they reloaded. Then an arrow shot past Elphaba's head; another thudded into the broom, narrowly missing her left hand_. _Pausing only to remove the arrow, she put on an extra burst of speed and accelerated away as fast as she could, gaining altitude as she went.

As she ascended to what was hopefully a safe height, Elphaba wondered what the survivors were going to do now that most of Oz had been claimed by the Nomes. Were they amassing arms to try and fight back? If so, what else did they have in their arsenal?

She was still wondering this when something sleek and metallic rocketed out of the canopy and exploded almost right next to her; thankfully, because of the various supplementary enchantments Elphaba had placed on the broom, the explosion didn't kill her, nor was it enough to dislodge her altogether. Unfortunately, it was enough to send the broom spiralling out of control towards the ground. Elphaba swore diabolically and tried to steer up, out of the death-dive, but it didn't take long to realise that while the enchantments had protected _her _well enough, the broomstick itself had been wrecked in the explosion: the handle was broken almost in two, and the straw bristles were either missing or on fire.

_Oh well,_ she thought absently, as the upper branches of the trees rushed up to meet her, _at least I know they have explosive shells at their disposal..._

Whispering what protective spells she could, she crashed headlong into the forest; down she flew, barely avoiding head-on collisions with the trunks of trees, just managing to keep the broomstick intact until a particularly sturdy-looking tree branch loomed out of the chaos at around knee height and neatly broke the fractured broom in two. Elphaba dropped at least ten feet to the forest floor and landed in a heap, badly bruised but otherwise unhurt.

She rose, awkwardly, still holding half of the broom, and realised that she was surrounded by a cluster of terrified-looking Munchkins.

Among the traditionally lethal array of guns, crossbows, and farming tools, Elphaba noticed that two of them were holding buckets of water.

What with trying not to laugh, it took a little while for Elphaba to find her voice. "Look," she said, trying not to sound too threatening, "Before you get too carried away, I'm not-"

One of the survivors poked her between the shoulders with his pitchfork. "Sh-shut it," he stammered. "Y-y-y-you just shut it."

"How the hell is she even alive?" hissed another.

"Nevermind that now," said another, who was almost unrecognisable as a Munchkin under the layers of camouflage she wore. "We've at least got something to show for this little scouting expedition; let's get back to the camp before those Nomes start wondering about the noise."

"Agreed," grunted another, hoisting a bewildering array of weaponry and canisters onto his back. "We've only got six of the damn shells left, and I don't have the materials to make more, so let's be off before we have to use any more."

The first of the survivors nodded, raised his pitchfork, and brought it down handle-first on Elphaba's head.

Elphaba was very much annoyed. For all their panic and stammering, the survivors had a very clear idea of what they thought should happen from here on, and it wasn't hard to imagine: immediately after the _devastating_ blow to her head, the Wicked Witch of the West would collapse in a heap; they would drag her back to camp and question her about her part in the invasion, whereupon she would scream and beg for mercy and volunteer every bit of information she had before they'd even started threatening her. One way or the other, she'd tell them how she had led the Nomes in conquering Oz, by what foul magic she had been resurrected, and how to stop her forces from carrying out her ghastly plans. The, being good Ozians they'd show mercy, and because she was the Wicked Witch of the West, she would immediately attack them, and they would have to melt her for the last time with a bucket of water. Then, with the information she had so cowardly volunteered, they would then go on to save all of Oz and be remembered as heroes.

Unfortunately for them, the Wicked Witch didn't quite react as expected:

"_Ow!_ What was that for?" said Elphaba, rubbing the back of her head.

There was an embarrassed pause.

"Well? Aren't we _going_ somewhere?"

"... W-We're supposed to knock you out first," said the first survivor.

"Hitting me on the head like that isn't going to do it! And is there something _wrong_ with just letting me walk there with you?"

The survivors gaped at her, and Elphaba had to fight hard not to laugh; in spite of the situation, she was actually enjoying herself. "Come on!" she said, infusing her voice with a touch of real irritation. "Let's not wait around for the Nomes! Like you said, we don't want to waste anymore of those shells- especially now that you've blasted my broom to smithereens with one of them!"

"Sorry," the third survivor whimpered.

"Don't be sorry!" Elphaba yelled. "Move! You wanted to take me back to the camp, now take me there!"

"What?"

"Move!" she clarified. "Ambulate in the general direction of the camp! You want to get there sometime before the Nomes come and tear us to pieces, right? So let's move!"

* * *

Unfortunately, the camp itself was little more than two or three badly-assembled military tents (presumably looted from a local barracks). The few other residents of this camp were naturally horrified to see Elphaba marching boldly down the path, and were only slightly mollified by the presence of their scouting party surrounding her on all sides. A very crowded twenty minutes followed, involving terrified shrieks, angry suggestions on what to do with her, and eventually, screamed insults and epithets.

Elphaba remained stoic throughout; she'd grown used to this sort of thing in the years beforehand.

What surprised her was how few of them were interested in just tossing a bucket of water over her and leaving it at that; perhaps they really did think interrogating her would be the best thing for her.

Before long, the survivors tired of shouting at her, and seemed to remember that she was apparently their prisoner, so they finally took away her satchel of magical items, tied her hands together, and shoved her into one of the tents.

"Welcome to your new home!" one of them spat at her.

To their credit, they were smart enough to have a guard watching her at all times. Unfortunately for them, that guard was armed only with a bucket of water.

Elphaba would have burst out laughing if she wasn't so tired; she'd barely slept the previous evening, and the adrenaline that had powered her through the past few hours was beginning to fade.

She knew that escaping the camp would be relatively easy, even without her satchel. The trick, of course, would be doing so without accidentally killing any of these twits; as much as she resented Ozians for blindly following every bit of propaganda thrown to them, she wasn't prepared to start murdering them all over again. Besides, as firsthand witnesses to the invasion, they might actually have some important information to share.

The next problem would be continuing the journey; with her broom destroyed (her _second_ broom, no less), she'd be crossing the Deadly Desert on foot unless she found another broom to enchant... or something else that might suit her purposes.

But first, she'd wait: she had the journey ahead to plan, she had the eventual attack on the Nome Dominions to prepare for, and a growing headache to try and recover from before she made good on her escape.

So, closing her eyes, she ignored the shouted arguments from the other tents, the crying of babies, and the all-pervading mutter of "We're doomed, we're doomed, we're doomed," and allowed herself to drift off to sleep.


	11. Strange Dreams, Strange Alliances

A/N: Well, ladies and gentlemen, here we have another chapter! Read and review- as alway, constructive criticism is welcome!

Disclaimer: I do not own anything of Wicked or Oz. Take my word for it.

* * *

A ringing silence descended on the attic as Madame Morrible's demagogic announcement came to a close; for a moment or two, Glinda and Elphaba stood by the barricaded door, rendered mute and paralysed by emotions- Elphaba by horror and betrayal, Glinda by fear, disbelief and frustration. All that they had seen and heard in the audience chamber was still flickering disjointedly through their minds, from the first sight of the Wizard's mechanical face bellowing down at them, to the way Chistery's new wings had seemingly _ripped _their way out of his twitching body.

Glinda was the first to regain the power of speech. She tried to speak as calmly as she could, but the mixture of fear and frustration rushing through her very quickly overrode not only her rationality, but most of her self control: "Elphaba," she hissed, "why couldn't you have stayed calm for _once_ instead of flying off the handle?"

Elphaba recoiled, as though she'd just been slapped across the face. Glinda's temper, meanwhile, took this as a chance to attack: "I hope you're happy!" she shrieked. "I really do! I mean, do you really think anyone in Oz will be willing to listen to what you've got to say about Animal Rights? Of course not, because you've been officially classificated as an enemy of the state! I hope you think you're clever, Elphaba, I really hope you think that what you've done somehow does a credit to those brains of yours!"

"And I hope you're happy too!" Elphaba screamed back. "I really hope you're proud of the way you acted back there- grovelling and cowering at the feet of that _fraud,_ all so you could feed your precious ambitions! Don't you even care about what he's been doing to the Animals, that's he's behind everything we came here to put an end to, or did you throw away your moral compass along with your self-respect?"

For another ten seconds they screamed and shouted and raged back and forth at one another; at long last, they stopped, out of breath, and almost in tears. And then, in the distance, there came the sound of booted feet marching up the stairs.

With a thrill of terror, Glinda realised that it was only a matter of time before they were found; she wasn't sure what would happen to her, but she knew that Elphaba could very well be facing execution- assuming the guards didn't just hack her to death there and then. And for all that she'd just screamed her frustrations at her, Glinda did not want to see her friend dead.

"Elphaba," she said urgently, "Listen to me- please; why can't you just say you're sorry?"

Elphaba gave her a look that could have fused sand into glass.

"I'm serious, Elphaba; the Wizard seemed like a fairly reasonable sort to me. True," she added hastily, as her friend's stare took on an expression of utter incredulity, "He's not really a wizard, and yes, he's responsible for what happened to Doctor Dillamond, but you've got to think about what you're doing: you came here to become Grand Vizier to the Wizard, don't forget. I mean, isn't that what you wanted?"

For a moment, there was silence, except for the shouts of the guards as they ascended the tower, battering doors open as they went.

When Glinda spoke next, she found herself almost pleading: "You can still be Vizier, Elphie; you can have everything you ever wanted-"

"I know," said Elphaba. Her voice was no longer angry; now, it was steady and determined. "But I don't want it anymore."

"_What?"_

"No, that's not true. I'd be lying to myself if I said I didn't want everything this position could offer. You see, Glinda, it's not that I don't want it... it's that I _can't_ want it anymore."

Glinda opened her mouth to ask what she could possibly mean by that, when she suddenly realised that she already knew what Elphaba meant; she knew what Elphaba would say and do next, and all that it would eventually lead to. Worst of all, she knew that this had happened before...

... And that she was almost certainly dreaming.

_And in reality, I'm asleep in a chair in a glorified prison cell, waiting to wake up so I can work to fulfil the wishes of an insane earth elemental, hoping that he'll send me back in time to this exact point as a reward and I'm only just beginning to wonder if he was telling the truth. How did my life get so complicated?_

Elphaba was leafing through the pages of the Grimmerie, now, trying to find the levitation spell again; the expression on her face was no longer lost and confused, but growing steadily more determined... and almost hopeful. And Glinda knew that that same determination and hope would remain with her for the next few years of her rebellion against the Wizard... until the deaths of both Nessarose and Fiyero brought an end to her hope. Her determination- in the form of the urge for vengeance, this time- would drag on until the fateful day at Kiamo Ko.

Suddenly, caught between watching Elphaba prepare herself and worrying over what would happen next, Glinda found herself wondering if it was possible to change what happened next. Even if this was only a dream, wouldn't there at least be a chance to see what could happen when the Nome King finally granted her the reward he promised?

_No,_ she thought. _Just because this is a dream taken from my memory doesn't mean that it's going to follow reality in any way. For all I know, this time she'll sprout wings of her own and go soaring off into the horizon with me bundled under her arm. Maybe the guards will burst in and kill us both. Maybe cupcakes will rain down from the sky and an army of Nomes will emerge from the earth to offer us discount plumbing. And besides, why would I even want to bother with this "dream of a better life" nonsense? I'm only going to be even more miserable when I eventually find out that the Nome King was lying about sending me back in time..._

Somewhere in the background, Elphaba began chanting the words of the spell, and Glinda began automatically reciting the same denials she had uttered that day... right up until the broomstick slowly floated into view.

"Glinda," said Elphaba, her voice just as urgent as Glinda's had been a moment ago, "Come with me." Still following the script, Glinda stared at her uncomprehendingly. "Think of what we could accomplish," Elphaba continued, almost pleading. "If we worked together, nothing could stop us- not the Wizard, not Morrible, not even the armies loyal to them. Just think of it!"

As her own voice continued following the script, Glinda remembered the self-doubt she'd felt at that moment; after all, what help could she possibly be to Elphaba? At that time, she'd had next to nothing in the way of magical power or knowledge beyond a few paltry spells, and more often than not, they didn't work anyway; she'd be nothing more than dead weight. Looking back, though, Glinda knew that she could have made a difference: after all, she had charisma, perhaps even enough to convince people that Elphaba wasn't the villain that Morrible had portrayed her as. Then again, even that wouldn't have guaranteed anything- especially not with the Wizard's legendary propaganda machine against her.

"Well? Are you coming?" Elphaba asked quietly.

Just as Glinda was contemplating the offer for the second time, the dream abruptly changed:

The thunderous sound of the approaching guards ground to a halt, and as the echoes began to die away, the room underwent an astonishing transformation: the walls shot outwards and the ceiling arched upwards as the attic expanded dramatically; the shelves and the heaps of junk scattered about the attic moulded themselves into lavish furniture- comfortable armchairs, oak dining tables, silver candelabra; the skylight oozed down the shifting brickwork and into the middle of the room, reshaping itself into an enormous circular mural window.

Even before the room's transformation was complete, Glinda had already realised what the attic had become: the design of that window and the landscape it overlooked told her everything.

_This_ was Kiamo Ko.

An ice-cold droplet of horror landed in the pit of Glinda's stomach, freezing her insides solid. Ever since Elphaba's death, she had gone out of her way to avoid the castle; whenever some special occasion demanded her presence there, she'd made excuses, pretended to be ill, whatever she could do to stay as far away as possible from the place where her friend had died. She could withstand the parades on the anniversary of the "Wicked Witch's death," but leading a pilgrimage to Kiamo Ko for a night of hypocrisy and meaningless ceremony would be intolerable.

Elphaba put a hand on her shoulder: "I know you don't want to be here, Glinda," she said gently, "But I'm anchored to your memories of this place; I can't properly communicate with you anywhere else in your dreams."

"B-but... you're a dream yourself! You're not real!"

"True," she said, a sad little smile on her face. "I'm just a figment of your imagination. But I'm also a memory given life by your desire to see me again. For all intents and purposes, I am everything that Elphaba Thropp was, and for what it's worth, I'm here to help you- if only to give you peace of mind."

Glinda tried to reply, but all that emerged was a choked whimper. Once she had finally managed to get her voice under control, she said, "I just... don't know what I'm supposed to do about all this. I mean, I'm betraying everything you worked for just for the sake of an impossible reward, and even if it _is_ possible, I can't tell if the King will honour the agreement."

She looked up, expecting to see disappointment on Elphaba's face, or worse still, rage or frustration or sorrow. But far from being angry or despairing, Elphaba's face was gentle and accepting. "There's nothing of betrayal about what you've done, Glinda," she said, soothingly. "My work- _our_ work-was doomed ever since the Nome King began to plot against us. Every single citizen of Oz has been either driven from their homes or slaughtered; right now, there's no such thing as _human_ rights, let alone Animal rights. So, as hateful as we both find it, the Nome King's reward is the only possible solution to our problems right now. But I can certainly see why you've had doubts about it."

"Well... yes- for a start, why would he bother sending me back in time? If he did, I might be able to stop him from ever invading!"

The imaginary Elphaba shrugged. "Maybe he was planning on erasing your memories of the invasion before he sent you on your way," she suggested. "That way, he wouldn't have to worry about you threatening his plans. Or maybe he's planning to use that little collection of artefacts he's gathered to place himself and everything he's accomplished _outside_ of history altogether, so when he does send you back in time, it won't matter what you try and do to him. Who knows?"

"But why would he bother to give me the reward in the first place? What's to stop him from just leaving me in my cell to rot?"

"If he did that, Glinda, then he'd have to keep you in the palace for the rest of your life. And he can't take that chance; you're far too dangerous for that, and far too useful to be executed."

Glinda let out a bitter, mirthless laugh. "Dangerous? _Useful?_ What are you talking about? I am not dangerous or useful any sense of the word: the only reason why I managed to get the slightest bit of an edge over the Nome King in the duel was because of the Grimmerie and the Bubble. As for usefulness, I'm only here as an _understudy_, and I'd have to study the Grimmerie for years on end to achieve even the slightest competence at that! Oh, and let's not forget how well I did as Protector of Oz!" she continued, her voice on the edge of hysteria. "How could anyone forget that my first day on the job ended with the Emerald City being invaded? And what about my try at _ruling_ Oz? I barely accomplished anything for the people, and even less for Animal Rights! And you know why? It's because I'm a failure and I always have been! I'm a stupid, selfish, overambitious little failure who thought she could do some good after causing the death of the one person in this world who could have made a difference-"

Without saying a word, Elphaba drew Glinda into a sudden embrace. Glinda stopped ranting, and for a moment, fell silent. Then, she started to cry.

"It wasn't your fault," Elphaba whispered.

"But it _was,_" Glinda sobbed. "Everything bad that happened to this country since that day in the attic has been _my fault! _How can you forgive me for what I did to you, for what I did to Oz?"

"Ssssshhhhhh..."

For several seconds, they stood there, Glinda crying, Elphaba wordlessly comforting her. Eventually, Elphaba spoke: "I've already forgiven you for what happened, Glinda, just as you forgave me for the damage I caused. Besides, you're making the same mistake I once made," she said. "You remember well enough that I used to hate myself for things I couldn't possibly be responsible for: the death of my mother, the damage done to Nessarose's legs. I told you that back at Shiz, and you were the one who helped me then; you were the one who said "Elphie, it was the milkflowers that did that!" remember?"

In spite of herself, Glinda let out a snort of laughter that suddenly metamorphosed into a long drawn-out burst of laughter- partly due to remembering her childish naivete, but mostly out of sheer relief.

Once Glinda had stopped laughing, Elphaba added, "Besides, we both know who's _really _responsible for all that's happened to Oz, don't we?"

"We do?"

"Of course: the Wizard. After all, you know the results of his little coup de tat: political terror, deprivation and discrimination, all of which you were left to clean up after the Wizard fled. The King told you all about the Wizard's theft of the Emeralds, so you can't be blamed for the invasion. And as for Nessa's death- you might have told them that I still cared about her, but, who was it who authorized her assassination? The Wizard. Who was it who authorised _my_ assassination? The Wizard."

And though her self-loathing roared its denial, Glinda found herself slowly agreeing.

"So you see, you don't have to blame yourself for what happened anymore, now that you know who was really at fault_._ And don't doubt your strength, either: you've had the strength to take the reins of power when lesser human beings would have delegated the task to someone else; you've had the strength to take on the Nome King in a duel to the death, and not only survive- but end up enlisted instead of executed! That's how I _know_ for a fact that you have the strength to complete the Nome King's task and set things right for all of Oz."

From somewhere overhead, there was a distant _boom,_ and a disembodied voice thundered _"Miss Glinda? It's time to rise."_ As the sound echoed through the castle, the very walls of the castle seemed to fade, losing first their colour, then their opacity, and finally, their solidity: for a moment, the walls of Kiamo Ko appeared to be made of water. Then, they began to evaporate, the landscape behind them dissolving along with them... followed swiftly by the rest of the castle.

Glinda felt her eyes sting with new tears, as the dreamworld began to collapse. "I'm going to have to wake up now, aren't I?" she asked quietly.

"I'm afraid so. But don't worry, Glinda; this isn't goodbye. I'll be here when you dream again; as long as the past is imperfect, as long as the worst of the Wizard's crimes plague Oz, I'll be here to help you..."

"_Miss Glinda?"_

_

* * *

_

The Nome King smiled, quietly withdrawing from Glinda's waking mind before she could notice his presence; it would seem that the evening's work had been a complete success: Glinda's doubts had been well and truly extinguished, and she was ready to stop wallowing in self-pity and approach her work with enthusiasm and diligence. He could barely stop himself from laughing as he watched Glinda lurch out of her chair, trying and failing to shove Basalt out of the way; she was hurrying to her desk, hurrying to get the Grimmerie open and begin her work.

"**No rest for the wicked, I suppose,"** he mused happily. **"Or for the virtuous, for that matter."**

Now, all that he needed to do was wait- either for Glinda to finish translating the necessary spell, for Elphaba to arrive at the Mountain, or for all the components of the ritual to be seized by Mombi. One main plan, and two contingencies, with as little as possible left to chance; yes, everything was falling into place...

Of course, Elphaba had been delayed by the unexpected interference of the survivors; who would have known that any of them would have been able to salvage artillery from the ruins, let alone put it to any use? Thankfully, she had survived the fall, and as far as the spies had reported, the survivors posed no extraordinary threat to her; Elphaba would soon be on her way again.

The King's musings were suddenly interrupted by the rumbling of a Nome Butler emerging from the wall across from him. "Your Majesty," the butler grovelled, "The Scarecrow is becoming increasingly disagreeable; he has requested an audience with you... again."

"**How many times has it been?"**

"Thirty-seven, Your Majesty."

"**Hmm. Perhaps it is time we domesticated our other prisoner somewhat... Have him brought to the outer balcony; I will attend to him soon..."**

**

* * *

**

Several hundred miles away, Elphaba opened her eyes, and looked up at the shape that had been kicking her for the past second or two; after a few minutes of blinking, she realised that it was the same terrified guard that had been watching her for the past few hours she'd been asleep.

"Morning," she said blearily.

"Shut it," snapped the guard, raising his bucket of water in what he probably thought was a threatening way. "There's someone to see you."

He stood aside to reveal the figure of another Munchkin standing in the doorway of the tent: this one looked even more pathetic than the guard, who at least had had the good fortune to scavenge some proper armour to make it _appear_ as though he was well-defended in spite of his terror. This latest visitor looked as though someone had connected a bicycle pump to his eyeballs and hadn't stopped pumping until the man's eyes were the size of saucers; his other features only made him look more pathetic, from the manic explosion of hair atop his head, to his sunken, neurotic-looking chin. He was dressed in the rumpled remains of a fairly expensive suit of clothes; perhaps he'd been a civil servant or official before the invasion- and perhaps this was why the guard appeared to be treating him as some kind of leader.

"Has she said anything?" he asked nervously.

"Nossir," grunted the guard, clearly trying to disguise his own nervousness. "She's been asleep for the last sixteen hours, sir."

"Really? I was wondering why you didn't have any problems keeping her in while I was away."

"She's been very quiet, for some reason, sir."

"_She_ is well within earshot," said Elphaba snidely. "If you want to say anything to me, now would be the time."

There was an embarrassed pause, as the official shuffled warily towards her; as he did so, Elphaba thought she saw the canvas door shift slightly, as though someone was standing outside, listening. Then again, knowing how she was viewed by the Ozians, the entire population of the refugee camp might be listening on all sides of the tent, just waiting to hear what the infamous Wicked Witch of the West had to say.

"Now," said the official, "I honestly don't want to get violent here, but we have been on the run from the Nomes for the better part of two days, and we need to know why they're doing this, how we can stop them, and what part you played in all of this."

Elphaba, deciding to make an attempt at diplomacy, smiled in a way she hoped would look accommodating, and said, "Would you believe me if I told you if I had nothing to do with it?"

"No," said the guard automatically.

"No," confirmed the official. "And I'm being serious when I say that I'm not afraid to use this." He pointed to the bucket of water. "Now, if you remember how painful it was for you last time, you'll tell us what we want to know."

Elphaba sighed. _Screw keeping this a secret,_ she thought.

And before anyone could even realise that she'd gotten her hands free, she grabbed the bucket of water out of the guard's hands, and before either of them could stop her, she'd dipped both her hands into the ice-cold water and begun to wash her face. There was a shocked gasp from the official and the guard, and many of the eavesdropping refugees were suddenly whispering, "What just happened?" or "Did she just do what I thought she did?"

This wasn't just for shock value, however; after sixteen hours sleeping in the dirt, Elphaba really needed a few handfuls of cold water to the face, if only to wash the sleep from her eyes and the dust from her cheeks. In any event, once she was certain that she'd shocked the observers enough, she dried her face with the hem of her cloak, and said, "Can we talk sensibly now?"

"But..." the guard mumbled hopelessly for several minutes. "But... how did you... I mean, everyone knew that you- everyone saw what happened when..."

To his credit, the official was much more level-headed: "What's there _not_ to be sensible about?" he said, exasperatedly. "We've just been invaded, for Oz's sake! We've lost everything we own, we're sleeping in tents, and you've somehow returned from the grave without your weakness to water! How are we not supposed to be serious about this?" He took a deep breath. "Look, I just want to know what the Nomes are up to besides invading, and if there's any way of stopping them."

"That makes two of us," said Elphaba, dryly.

"What?"

"You heard. I've heard reasons for why the Nomes would invade, but they don't answer all the connected questions. And as for stopping the Nomes, I was following the only lead I had when you shot me down."

"You expect us to believe that?"

Elphaba smiled sadly. "Of course not: nobody in all of Oz has believed a word I've said in my own defence for the last few years- with a few exceptions. But what I've told you is the truth: the only reason why I returned to Oz in the first place was to find out what had happened."

The official took a deep breath, and said, "Just because you're suddenly immune to water, don't start thinking that we've run out of ways to make you talk. I mean, we've got-"

"Before you start describing every weapon you've managed to salvage so far, I think I should make a few things clear to you: before you entered this tent, my hands were tied." She presented the shredded lengths of rope that still dangled from her wrists. "It took me all of five seconds to slice through them with my magic. the only reason I haven't left this tent and gone looking for another broom I can enchant is because, quite frankly, I may need your help."

There was a very long pause; for a moment, Elphaba thought crickets really would chirp, if only for the sake of cliché. Then the official all but shouted, "Are you _serious?"_

"I've never been more serious in my life," said Elphaba. "Besides, you're running low on weapons effective against the Nomes, aren't you? I know spells that can shatter rock like glass. Doesn't that sound useful to you?"

"A more important question would be- how am I supposed to trust you, of all people?"

Elphaba thought of all the things she could say to this man; that the Wizard had lied about her, that she'd been the victim of propaganda for the last few years of her life, that in reality all she wanted was equal rights for Animals; that she was a lot more trustworthy than the Nomes currently scouring the countryside for living Ozians to mince beneath their feet; that she wanted the same thing that he and the other refugees wanted- the safety of those she loved. But by now, she'd learned that trying to reason points like these with a panicky Ozian was less than pointless.

So, she said, "You can't. But it's the only option you have at this point; and truth be told, it's beginning to sound like the only option I have right now: I don't fancy attacking the Nome King's Mountain alone."

"So you're going to use _us_ as an army?"

"You said you wanted to stop the Nomes," Elphaba pointed out. "If you've got any better ideas, let me know."

Before the Official could answer, another refugee hurried into the tent (keeping one eye trained on Elphaba at all times), whispered something into his ear, and hurried away. "Damn it," he muttered, and turned to leave.

"I'd appreciate an answer," said Elphaba. "Would you agree to an alliance?"

The Official sighed. "I'll take it under consideration," he said wearily, and turned to the guard. "You are to keep her under guard until we're ready to get moving; if she tries to escape, shoot her."

"Yessir," said the guard, readying his crossbow.

As the official scurried away, Elphaba thought about the future: these people didn't seem like much of an army, but if the explosive shells she'd heard mention of really were effective against Nomes, and a way of mass-producing them could be devised, there might just be hope yet.

But first, she'd have to get past the most obvious obstacle- ie, her potential allies wanted her dead.

"Ah well," she said, "No rest for the wicked."


	12. Welcome Home

A/N: At long last, a new chapter! I hope you enjoy it ladies and gentlemen- as always, constructive criticism is appreciated!

Disclaimer: As always, Wicked does not belong to me.

* * *

The first few hours travelling with the refugee group were particularly trying.

As expected, none of them were particularly happy with the idea of dragging Elphaba along with them; thankfully, neither the official or the guard had mentioned anything of the possible alliance, otherwise they probably wouldn't have even been able to leave. Nonetheless, that didn't stop one or two of the refugees from tossing buckets of water at her when the guard ushered her out of the tent, and this time, the horrified gasps of the onlookers weren't nearly as funny.

"Looks like they weren't _all_ eavesdropping," Elphaba muttered sourly. As she went about the laborious process of wringing the water out of her cloak, the guard hesitantly prodded her towards the middle of the gathering crowd, barking "Stand aside, please; we've got to keep her right in the centre, stop her from running away. Governor's orders." In the end, she found herself surrounded on all sides by people, a gap of at least four feet between her and them, her hands once again tied and a crossbow pointed at her back as they began marching westward.

All in all, there were seventeen refugees, including the official and the guard: most of them were Munchkins, with the exception of the two very visible businessmen from Gillikin country, fwho'd apparently arrived in Munchkinland for a conference on industrial development. At the moment, they stood at the front of the crowd, talking worriedly about how their home offices might be faring and occasionally trying to get the attention of the official, who was- if their excited mumblings were to be believed- none other than the Governor of Munchkinland.

From what little Elphaba could hear from the whispered conversation all around her, one of the most recent arrivals had brought word that a platoon of Nomes were moving in the direction of the forest, and the Governor was leading the refugees as far away from them as possible. Another topic being whispered of was the fact that the forest they were trying to leave hadn't been a forest at all until the Nome invasion: apparently, some of the refugees had seen a gigantic Nome casting a spell on the orchard.

Elphaba pondered this as the conversation turned to the more familiar topic of just how they would go about killing her. There _were_ spells that could be used to accelerate the growth of the trees, but most of them were fiendishly complicated and remarkably obscure to boot. Perhaps the Nomes had some knowledge of them, but why would they have used any of them on an _orchard _of all things?

"Damnable witch," someone snarled behind her. "Oughta tie her to a tree and leave her for the Nomes."

_Here we go,_ Elphaba thought. _Just grit your teeth and keep walking._

"Why bother? She's probably working for them anyhow. Just cut her wrists and watch her bleed to death- see if her blood's green, too."

"Better yet, try something nice and slow," another voice hissed, this one belonging to a bizarrely thuggish-looking Munchkin with a neck like an upturned mixing bowl and a face that looked as though it had been scrubbed vigorously with sandpaper. "I know a place that's still standing- even the Nomes didn't want to touch it- and it'll be just full of stuff like that."

There was a derisive laugh from one of the other refugees, this one a woman at the front of the group. "Call me crazy, but I don't think our esteemed governor is going to let you go fossicking around in the cellars of the old manor for some rusty torture machine that might not even be there."

"Of course it'll be there! Have you forgotten who owned the place? She had hundreds of people arrested for speaking against her, and in prison, all of them were-"

"Woolwax, my dad worked in that house for five years as a servant, and from the day he was hired until the day he was fired, he never saw any torture machines in the house. Besides, I don't think even someone as crazy as the Wicked Witch of the East would actually have any of the political offenders locked up in her cellar: she had _prisons_ for that."

"Besides," Elphaba said quietly, "The house doesn't _have_ any cellars."

"Shut your face," snapped Woolwax automatically. "Once we get to the manor, we're gonna dig up the thumbscrews, and we're gonna-"

"_No, we're not,"_ the Governor interjected. "We're going to keep on walking until there's a good deal of distance between us and the Nomes and a bit of shelter over our heads. And before you say anything," he added, seeing Woolwax's mouth open hopefully, "We're not going to use the manor as shelter. My predecessor had all the doors and windows locked and boarded up, so unless anyone here has a crowbar, a set of lockpicks and the guarantee that the Nomes won't notice us while we're using either of them, I suggest that we keep on moving."

There was silence for several minutes, except for the odd mumble of "Thumbscrews," from Woolwax. Several people broke it by making some half-hearted death-threats, or grumbling about how their great uncle wouldn't have stood for having the witch being allowed among them, or how many people had been killed in whatever calamity that Elphaba had cause. Eventually, the forest slowly began to clear, and before long, the crumbling walls of ruined buildings could be seen in the distance. By the time the last oversized lunchpail tree was behind them, the refugees had stopped snarling amongst themselves, and started watching for Nomes.

It was a slow march through the ruins: every now and again, they'd stop, one of the lookouts hissing that they'd seen something moving in the distance or heard the rumble of an approaching Nome. All too often, the group would be delayed by the urge to stop and stare in horror at the ruins, or to try and retrieve something from amidst the shattered brickwork. Elphaba was well aware that standing pokerfaced amid the carnage wasn't helping her case, but quite frankly, there wasn't much left to horrify her; she'd seen the ruins of the Emerald City and its petrified citizens, and she'd had time to grieve over both the flying monkeys and the sad little memorial that Glinda had built.

Yes... she'd probably have nothing else to do but walk, defend the group from incoming attackers, ignore the death threats being flung at her, and hope that nobody would have the guts to make good on those threats, all for the next few hours- if not the next few days. After all, the refugees had no intention of letting her begin hunting the ruins for a broom or anything else that could be enchanted to fly. And there was so much to plan for, as well: how they were going to go about mass-producing the explosive shells, how she was supposed to make any of the refugees trust her, and when she did, how she was supposed to even start fighting the Nomes...

Several hours later, she found herself unexpectedly proven wrong: by that stage, they had reached what had obviously once been a much more affluent region- if the sheer space between the ruined mansions was any evidence. By now, it had been so comprehensively demolished that Elphaba didn't even realise where she was until she saw the manor looming on the horizon.

* * *

Just as the Governor had said, its windows and doors had been thoroughly boarded up; ivy had grown across it in several places, erasing the side entrance and strangling the balcony; the perimeter wall had been torn to pieces, and numerous "CONDEMNED: DO NOT ENTER" signs protruded from the rubble. Other than that, though, the house was exactly as it had been when Elphaba had last visited it over a year ago. Back then, she'd been astonished at how little it had changed in the years since she'd last set foot in it, but then, her father had always been obstinate and resistant to change, even if it was something as basic as a renovation; as for Nessarose... well, the house had always been more of a home for her than it had been for Elphaba. Perhaps that had been why she had secluded herself here after her graduation: with father dead of shame, Boq trying to leave, and the pressures of governance weighing down on her, the best sanctuary that could be found was her childhood home. But when, in the years between her rise to power and Elphaba's ill-fated visit, had she realised her newfound authority? When had she decided that the only way she could keep Boq at her side was by suspending the rights of Munchkins?

_You probably helped there,_ said a poisonous voice in the back of her mind. _I hardly think that she'd have been totally alone in that house without your reputation hovering over her..._

Elphaba shook herself, ignoring the call of her guilt and focussing on more important things- for example, why had the Nomes left the house standing? They'd torn down just about every single building in all of Oz, so what made this one so special?

There was a stabbing pain between Elphaba's shoulders, and she realised that the guard had just jabbed her in the back with his crossbow; apparently she had been standing still a little too long for his tastes.

However, it seemed that several refugees had stopped to stare at the decrepit mansion as well, in spite of the Governor's best efforts. Of course, this had naturally set Woolwax off again: "I'm telling you," he said loudly, "this is the best possible place to hide for the next few days on. I mean, if the Nomes haven't touched it-"

"Have you got the tools to get those boards off the front door?"

"No, but that doesn't mean we can't find some around; there's a hardware store just a mile or three down the road..."

As the argument skidded back and forth, the guard turned to Elphaba and unexpectedly remarked, "Quite a sight, isn't it? The mansion, I mean. People think it's haunted nowadays; they say the Wicked Witch of the East's ghost haunts the study an' the drawing room. I seen kids trying to get in on dares, pryin' boards off the windows and everything, just to catch a glimpse of her. Not that they ever got in- place used to have security guards."

Elphaba sighed deeply. "Are you trying to have a conversation or have you just gotten tired of telling me to shut up?" she asked, snidely. "And no, I don't think it's quite I sight, I grew up there and after what happened to Nessarose, I never wanted to return."

"Oh." The guard looked crestfallen. "Wait a minute, who's Nessarose?"

Damn it, _this_ again. One thing that had always irritated Elphaba was the way that her name and Nessarose' name had vanished so readily once the Wizard's propaganda machine had begun turning against them: as far as the general population of Oz was concerned, they were and always had been nameless except for the title of Wicked Witch. And maybe this could be justified by the fact that neither of them had ever been terribly well-known before they became infamous -father had been very careful to keep Nessa cloistered and spoiled, and Elphaba had been an outcast from the start- but that still didn't explain everything.

"It doesn't matter," said Elphaba. "Not at this point, anyway. And why are we talking, anyway? You're not doing a good job of pretending that you don't hate me, you know."

"I know that, but if I don't speak my mind I'm going to go out of it, and with this lot moanin' about which rock we're going to hide under for the next few days, I'm runnin' short on people to talk to. So, if you're not too busy plannin' the downfall of what's left of Oz, could you please tell me who the hell Nessarose is?"

"Ah, _now_ we're cooking with gelignite. But seriously, you couldn't guess that..." Elphaba suddenly fell silent, her eyes fixed on the distant ruins behind the mansion; something enormous was moving up on those hills, something with skin like the face of a cliff. The guard turned, following her gaze, and if the sharp intake of breath was any evidence, he saw it too. "Nomes!" he boomed. "NOMES!"

As one, the refugees turned to the guard, and then to the hillside ruins. The Governor had just enough to say, "Don't panic, it hasn't seen us yet," before Woolwax began sprinting down the path towards the front door of the mansion, followed closely the other refugees. "Oh for Oz's sake!" the Governor shouted after them. "Did any of you even hear what I said? _It hasn't seen us yet!_ And besides, have you all forgotten that we can't get the boards off the... the..." He stopped, and seemed to sag. "Is _anyone_ listening to me?" he asked nobody in particular.

Elphaba looked from the Nomes slowly emerging from the ruins to the small crowd of people attacking the doors and windows of the mansion with what pitiful weaponry they'd managed to gather, and reached a decision: taking a deep breath, she grabbed the Governor by the collar and began dragging him down the path towards the front door.

By the time they reached it, the refugees were beginning to despair. "It's no good, Governor," the guard panted. "We can't get through the-"

"Boards," finished the Governor, smiling in a way that suggested that he was about to go for the man's jugular. "I know: my predecessor was very thorough. So, does anyone have any other ideas? Quickly now, before the Nomes appear and flatten us into ornamental paving stones."

Elphaba coughed politely. "If everyone could please move away from the door..."

"This wouldn't have happened if we'd have just gone down to the hardware store!" Woolwax bawled, oblivious to the coughing. "We'd have been inside if you'd let me go down the road and get a-"

Stifling a sigh of annoyance, Elphaba waved a hand, propelling the crowd of refugees apart, all of them landing awkwardly in the long grass on either side of the doorway. Another two quick gestures neatly smashed the once-sturdy wooden planks into matchsticks and catapulted the door inwards at such a speed and with such force that Elphaba found herself marvelling that it wasn't simply torn from its hinges.

For a moment, there was a confused silence as the bewildered Ozians processed the fact that the Wicked Witch of the West hadn't just killed them. Then the Governor shouted, "INSIDE!" Galvanised by the sound of his voice, they charged inside, barely waiting for Elphaba and the Governor to follow before they slammed the door shut.

_And here we go, _thought Elphaba grimly, as darkness descended on them, _back to a place I hoped to never set foot in for as long as I lived. This seems to be my week for breaking old vows..._

* * *

The entrance hall was ankle-deep in dust, and pitch black except for the pale green light that Elphaba had conjured; for the moment, all that was illuminated was the staircase, the cage-lift, and several hallways and passageways, all of them in decay and disrepair, and all of them leading off into stygian darkness. Of course, the frightened faces of the refugees were also illuminated, and Elphaba knew at once that most of them were staring at her.

"Right," said the Governor, "Now that we're inside, all we've got to do is make sure that the Nomes don't know we're in here. I don't know if they'll notice that the door's no longer boarded up, but there's not a hell of a lot we can do about that right now. In the meantime, I think we should also search the building; my predecessor wasn't too interested in removing anything from the house before it was closed off, so there's a chance there might be something useful still here."

"So _now_ you want to loot the place," said Woolwax smugly. "I don't suppose there's any chance I could have an apology in the next five minutes?"

Under the emerald glow of Elphaba's handheld light, the Governor's exasperated expression looked particularly grotesque; for a moment, he looked as though he was actually about to respond, but instead turned to Elphaba. "Would your sister have kept anything useful around the house? Maps? Weapons? Tools? Anything that we can put to practical use?"

"Well, if nobody's thrown anything of our old library away, there should be a few atlases there- if they haven't been eaten by rats or anything. As for weaponry and tools, you've got the kitchen and the toolshed at your disposal. And amongst other things, we've also got..." She glanced around the room until she found the side table, reached into the small drawer in its side, and drew out an armful of candles, placing them on the floor.

Woolwax glared at Elphaba, and then saw the thoughtful expression on the Governor's face. "You're not going to just take all this on faith, are you?"

"Of course not," said the Governor, briskly. "We've got the rest of the day to search the place, after all. Now, if I remember the floor plan of this place correctly, the library should be on the east wing of the ground floor, the kitchen likewise, and... um... the tool shed will have to wait until we're sure that the Nomes aren't watching the garden." He paused, and appeared to be counting under his breath. "Right," he said eventually, and pointed to a small cluster of refugees. "The seven of you, take some candles and search the upper floor- but be careful around the stairs, they might be rotten. And for godsakes, don't touch the lift. Woolwax, you and the four next to you search the east wing. And you three investigate the north end of the house- it shouldn't need too much exploration. Mr Gnoll," the guard obligingly clanked to attention, "You and I will investigate the west wing and the study."

"But what about the Witch?" someone asked quietly.

The Governor swallowed. "She'll go with me. More specifically," he said over the resulting din of confusion, "She'll take the lead. After all, she's the one holding the light."

After a brief squabble, in which twice as many coarse epithets than normal were used, the refugees gathered up their candles and began edging furtively into the shadows. Seeing Gnoll (now with a small candle perched on the brim of his helmet) positioning his crossbow between her shoulders, Elphaba sighed, turned to her left, and began marching down the corridor, Governor walking beside her.

Against all expectations, less than ten steps along, Elphaba found speaking- if only to take her mind off the problems that needed to be solved sooner or later. "Is it my imagination," she asked quietly, "Or are you starting to trust me?"

"No," said the Governor. "I still don't trust you, but I know for a fact that you're not an idiot."

"What does that have to do with anything? Hang on a minute, we've got a door here..."

As the three of them hesitantly explored the shadows of the drawing room, the Governor explained: "It means that while I can't trust you with my life, it means that I can trust you not to make stupid decisions; I mean, back outside, you could have just run for it, and ended up being caught and killed by the Nomes for your trouble."

"I've already told you I've got spells that can shatter rock, haven't I?"

"True, you could have fought quite a few of them off, but that doesn't mean that they wouldn't have eventually succeeded in killing you. So, rather than getting yourself flatted into a makeshift doormat for this house, you showed that you were smarter than that. And given that you're staggering around a dark room, with no certain way out and a crossbow at your spine, I'd assume you're smart enough not to try and turn on us now."

"Thanks. I think." She sneezed. "Have you found anything useful?"

"Other than some comfy chairs, nothing. Let's get out of here."

Back in the corridor, Elphaba found herself muttering, "Tell me, before the invasion, did you always have to calculate risks as often as you have in the last two days, or have Munchkin politics quietened since my sister was in power?"

"Well, it took a few months for the country to recover from..." He hesitated. "...From the regime change," he continued delicately. "But it settled down eventually: laws were rewritten, business started booming, and everything was flourishing- until the invasion, of course. But truth be told, I'm new to all this. In fact, I'm only the _acting_ Governor, and I wasn't exactly high on the list of chosen substitutes if you know what I mean."

"How far down on the list were you?"

"Uh, right at the bottom," the Governor admitted sheepishly. "I think the only reason I ended up on the list to begin with was because I was already privy to the same emergency procedures that all the other substitutes would have to be briefed in during national crises."

"Who were you?"

"Iwstgvnrsctry."

"What?"

Even under the mixture of green and yellow light, Elphaba could see clearly that the Munchkin was blushing. "I was the Governor's secretary before the invasion- secretary and personal assistant, to be pedantic."

For a moment, there was silence except for the sound of Gnoll chuckling to himself, and the creak of the next door being opened. "I was wondering how you managed to have access to the floor plan of this place," said Elphaba quietly. "Was this the same reason why you actually knew that the invaders were Nomes in the first place?"

"Of course. You'd be _amazed_ at the things people have left in the archives. It didn't explain why they're on the warpath, but at least we know who they are."

"Well, if it's any comfort, you're doing a lot better than the last Governor's assistant I ran into."

"Thanks. I think. Gnoll, _what_ are you doing with that pail?"

"Just checking to see if I can use it as a better helmet, sir."

"Put the damn thing down, Gnoll; you don't know what's been sitting in it for the past year. Besides," he added over the hasty clatter, "I don't think we're going to find anything of use in here, anyway: this looks like the ground floor bathroom."

Once they were back in the corridor, Elphaba remarked, "By the way, I never got your name."

"Quintether Rasp. And yours?"

"Elphaba Thropp."

There was a muffled expletive from Gnoll, followed by the sound of someone falling heavily against a door, and then an equally heavy crunch of termite-gnawed wood collapsing under the guard's considerable weight. As the echoes died away, Elphaba shone her handheld light in the general direction of the noise, revealing that Gnoll was now lying on the opposite side of a wrecked door at the end of the corridor, his head clasped firmly between his knees. "Are you alright, sir?" he said eventually.

"Gnoll, you just leaped through a door: I'd be more worried about your own health at this point if I were you."

"Sorry, sir: I was always told that hearin' a Wicked Witch's real name burned you from the inside out."

Rasp's left eyebrow crashed into his hairline. "Er, I don't think I've heard that one, Gnoll, and believe me, I've heard them all." There was a derisive snort from behind the broken door. "No, really, I have: I think archives documented just about every single tall tale ever told about the Wicked Witches, including the one that turned out to be tr..." He paused, and looked sharply at Elphaba.

_He's catching on,_ she thought. _Who knows? Maybe he might be clever enough to guess at the truth._ "Is there something wrong?" she asked aloud.

"Nothing, nothing," he mumbled absently. "Uh, Gnoll, I don't suppose you'd mind opening the door for us? _Manually,_ if you please."

* * *

Once they were inside, it didn't take long for Elphaba to realise where they were: even a year's worth of dust and cobwebs couldn't disguise the fact that this room had once been the study, where Nessarose had taken her very first steps with the aid of the Ruby Slippers, and Boq had quite literally lost his heart. Unnervingly, not a single piece of furniture had been disturbed in all that time since then: the drawers and cabinets were still locked; no books had been removed from the shelves; apart from the dust, the desk was arrayed as neatly as it had been.

And behind the desk, its scarlet cushions faded and its wheels strung with cobwebs, sat Nessa's wheelchair.

"Who do you suppose that belonged to?" Gnoll asked softly, as he tried to force one of the desk drawers open.

Elphaba couldn't bring herself to answer; to her surprise, however, Rasp whispered, "I would imagine that it belonged to the Wicked Witch of the East."

"You mean-?"

"Yes: most of the records pertaining to the Wicked Witches were destroyed as per the Wizard's orders, but a few survived... and ended up in the government archives during my last inspection. They're mostly reports by doctors, official diagnoses and the like; for one reason or another, they don't mention names- only official titles- but they do mention that for most of her life, the Wicked Witch of the East was paralysed from the waist down."

Gnoll goggled at the luxurious wheelchair. "So this thing here actually belonged to the Wicked Witch of the East?" he whispered in awe.

"Her name was Nessarose," said Elphaba quietly.

"What?"

"I said, _her name was Nessarose_."

There was a deathly silence. _Why did I even say that out loud?_ Elphaba thought bitterly. _It's not as if any of them really care; it's not as if they'd apologise. It's not as if any of these gormless twits would even comprehend what had happened and why. As far as any of them are concerned, anything we've ever done was all in the name of pure, undiluted evil._ She pinched the bridge of her nose, and sighed; _let's see how long I can keep my temper under control..._

And then Gnoll brought the silence crashing down by asking, "Were you the one who taught your sister how to use magic?"

_Four seconds._ "Oh for f- what are you _talking _about?" Elphaba exploded; Gnoll jerked backwards in alarm, dropping his crossbow. "Exactly which inbred backwater did you hear that rumour in?" Elphaba carried on, throwing courtesy to the wind. "Nessarose didn't learn magic from _anyone! _She didn't study it, she didn't practice it, and she definitely had no natural talent in it! Apart from being my sister, she'd had absolutely nothing to do with magic up until the day before she died, and the only reason that happened was firstly because I wanted to make up for all the trouble I caused her, and secondly because I was stupid enough to leave the Grimmerie open on the floor when her assistant tendered his resignation! After that, Nessarose had absolutely _nothing_ to do with magic apart from the Ruby Slippers, which were used exclusively to help her walk, and she only wore them for the last thirty-two hours of her life before Dorothy Gale's house crushed her to death. Do I make myself clear?"

She took a deep breath, and realised that while Gnoll had been fumbling to retrieve his crossbow, Rasp had drawn a silver letter-opener from his pocket and was now pointing it at her throat; for a moment, Elphaba wondered if she should take the man seriously, for his hand was clearly trembling. Then common sense kicked in: "There's no need for that, Governor," said Elphaba softly.

"Just making sure the conversation stays civil, Miss Thropp. And," he added, gently withdrawing the blade, "while we're on the subject, exactly what did your sister do to the assistant? I presume this was the same assistant that wasn't as lucky as me. If the employment records were accurate enough, his name was Boq- and he was the very last member of staff to leave this manor."

"He's alive, if that's what you're wondering."

"Well," said Rasp coldly, "Whatever your sister did to him must have been horrible, because he certainly didn't show his face after her death, even when his family sent out search parties to look for him. So what happened to him?"

"I'm afraid it's not my place to answer that question." And that was the truth, wasn't it? Even if Boq had been missed by his family, he'd done his very best to avoid encountering them ever again after his transformation. If he didn't want his past to be known, then surely it was his right to have it kept that w-

Rasp interrupted this train of thought by snapping, "Then perhaps it's your place to answer me this: if your sister had no magical power of her own, and no way of using magic without the Grimmerie, then explain _that."_ He pointed to the wall behind Elphaba.

Very slowly, she turned, and found herself facing a massive crater; an entire section of the plaster had been crushed inwards, as if a battering ram the side of a stagecoach had been hammered against it. "I don't know much about construction or architecture for that matter," said Rasp, "But something tells me that this didn't occur naturally, and since nobody's touched this room since the manor was abandoned last year, I'd say there aren't too many other culprits."

Elphaba suddenly felt as though her blood had turned to ice. "Other than the Nomes," she mumbled.

"What?"

"Back in the Emerald City, the Nomes looted just about anything magical they could get their hands on; so, they came here looking for more artefacts, and when they couldn't find anything, either one of them decided to inspect the wall for hidden compartments, or lost his temper." She bit her lip. "If any of the others find holes in the floor, I think we should leave as quickly as possible: if the Nomes have left this house in one piece, they might have plans to return."

"So what you're saying is that the Nomes tunnelled through the floorboards, went rummaging through the house for whatever magical artefact they thought they could find here, and when it didn't show up, one of them thumped the wall before throwing in the towel for the day. Is that right?"

"Well, yes. Doesn't it make sense?"

Rasp made a valiant attempt not to look sceptical, and failed miserably. "Miss Thropp," he said on a tone of exaggerated diplomacy, "How could something the size of a Nome walk through this house without disturbing the dust?"

"Besides," grunted Gnoll, "That hole's been there for ages- it's had time to decay."

"Oh, and I suppose you were a builder before you were a security guard," Elphaba sneered.

"How'd you guess?"

"Oh, _shut up!_ You," she snapped, rounding on Rasp, "You said that this place hadn't been entered since the manor was abandoned. What if one of the builders vandalised the wall while they were-"

"No, because nobody went inside the house at all; all the work was done from the outside. I'm afraid you're going to face the fact that your sister had magical power and you didn't even know it."

Elphaba sighed, and tried not to lose her temper. "Look," she said carefully, "I know that Nessarose was about three steps removed from insanity by the time I visited her, but magic's a completely different issue altogether: when did she start learning? Without any inherent gift, it would have taken her quite a while to learn how to deliver the force needed to crush that wall inwards... and more to the point, _where_ did she get her knowledge? Oz doesn't exactly have a thriving trade in authentic spellbooks, you know, and Nessa certainly didn't own any artefacts that might have provided the knowledge or the power."

* * *

Several hundred miles away, the spymaster repeated these words, and the Nome King laughed quietly behind one monolithic hand. **"Oh, Elphaba,"** he chortled, **"If you only knew..."**

* * *

Back in the manor, Elphaba and Rasp turned at the sound of approaching footsteps: it was Woolwax, accompanied by another man whom Elphaba recognised as the artilleryman who'd shot her down in the first place. They were both holding two enormous sacks, and though the words stencilled on them couldn't be seen in the dim light, the foul chemical odour wafting from the sacks was information enough.

"Good news," said Woolwax gleefully. "Young Curter and I managed to sneak these out of the toolshed."

Rasp groaned: "You really weren't listening when I advised against it, were you?"

"Don't worry sir," Curter soothed. "We made sure none of them saw us. Besides, look at what we've managed to find- but mind that candle, this stuff's very flammable."

With Elphaba providing light, Rasp peered awkwardly at the one of the labels, and then leaped back in alarm. _"Gunpowder?"_ he hissed. "Why the merry hell would there be a store of gunpowder in the toolshed?"

"As far as we can tell, someone broke into the shed a while ago and up until now he's been using it as a private storehouse for a lot of dangerous ordinances- most of them stolen from local barracks and excavation sites, by the look of things. We've taken note of just about anything useful in the shed, and believe me, we are in serious luck!" He handed Rasp a sheet of paper.

After reading for several seconds, Rasp looked up rather sheepishly. "Not to sound ignorant," he asked hesitantly, "But what the hell is t... trin... trinitrotoluene? And why is having over four hundred pounds of it such a good thing?"

And suddenly, in spite of all the strife and chaos that she'd been embroiled in, in spite of all the screaming and shouting and misery and pain, Elphaba found herself laughing with genuine mirth. Eventually, she calmed enough to notice Rasp's bewildered stare, and took a very close look at the list in his hand. "You know," she said brightly, "I think the situation might just be looking up!"

"Why's that, exactly?"

"Because, O Esteemed Governor, we now have exactly the kind of explosives we need to combat the Nomes en mass!"


	13. A Land Remade

A/N: For those of you who don't like Mombi, fair warning: she's present in this chapter.

Other than that, hopefully this is a chapter everyone can enjoy. Read and review, ladies and gentlemen, read and review!

Disclaimer: I do not own Wicked, etc, etc...

* * *

"For the forty-second time, get off me! GET OFF! Ge- oh, why am I bothering?"

One of the crows blinked stupidly down at Fiyero, and pecked absently under its left wing; the other twelve carried on hunting about his clothing for wherever that smell of rotten meat might be wafting from. Fiyero would have given anything just to be able to move his limbs, to shake the bastards off, but he couldn't: the stone men- the Nomes, as he knew them now- had made sure of that. Right now, tied to this crude scaffolding, he really was just a very talkative scarecrow.

_Well, most scarecrows aren't placed atop cliffs,_ Fiyero thought bemusedly. _And at least I've got a more interesting view this time around._

And this was true: above him, the towering horns of the Nome King's Mountain provided shelter for dozens of other carrion-birds eager to investigate the tiny figure bound between them. Below him, the Nome Kingdom stretched out in mile after mile of uninhabited plateau; as the Nomes lived exclusively beneath the earth none of them had much interest in colonizing the surface. In the distance, Fiyero could see the long expanse of the Deadly Desert that separated the kingdom from Oz... And if he strained his eyes, he could just about discern the green fields of Munchkinland.

There was a lot of smoke on that horizon, though; it didn't take a genius to guess that the invasion had spread far and wide across Oz, without much successful opposition. Why would there be? Oz had no standing army other than local guardsmen, who'd only be equipped to put down rioters and rebellious witches at the most. Unless they had some kind of artillery at their disposal (which didn't sound likely) they'd be slaughtered by the hundreds.

Fiyero let out a long, drawn-out snarl of frustration: he'd been up here for hours, now, waiting for an audience with the Nome King... after spending hours slumped in the darkness, waiting for an audience with the Nome King! Was he ever going to speak with him, or were the Nomes just screwing with him? It was certainly beginning to look like it; after all, now that his powerbase had been demolished in the invasion, what right did he have to demand anything from his jailers? They'd probably leave him up on the cliff for another few hours, and then drag him back into the shadows... and this time, they'd _leave_ him there and forget all about him.

_Elphaba,_ he thought, _I hate to nag, but I really wouldn't mind it if you appeared and saved the day right about now. Come to think of it, I'd be happy just knowing that my message reached you._

There was a polite cough from his left; Fiyero turned just in time to see another Nome emerging from the wall; in startling contrast to the blank-faced servants who'd manhandled him up and down the corridors, this one was beared and smiling. For good measure, he was also conspicuously taller than most of the other Nomes Fiyero had met so far, and the five points of what could only be a crown emerged from his head.

"**I hope this is not a bad moment,"** said the Nome King.

Fiyero eyed the crows still pecking at his clothing. "Oh, I don't think these damn things mind you intruding," he remarked sarcastically. "Do you?"

The crows cawed indifferently, and went back to searching his clothes for rotten meat.

"**You must excuse my being late for our meeting, Your Highness; I've been very busy of late with the territory we've successfully annexed. But enough of all that," **he said, apparently oblivious to Fiyero's outraged expression, **"Allow me to introduce myself: King Roquat the Red, at your service. And you, of course, are the Scarecrow, King of Oz- or, to use your birth name, Fiyero Tiggular. You don't mind if I call you Fiyero, do you?"**

Fiyero's jaw dropped. "How the hell do you know my name?"

"**A little stone bird told me," **the King chuckled cryptically. **"I have quite an aviary. But enough about me- let's talk about you. You wanted an audience with me, yes?"**

"Well, yes," grumbled Fiyero, barely keeping a civil tone. "I'd like to know why you invaded, thank you very much; what are you planning to do with Oz, now that you've conquered it? What are you going to do with _me?_"

"**Our invasion was one of retribution... and, of course, it was also to retrieve a stolen cultural treasure: you saw my soldiers removing the emeralds from the walls of the Emerald City, did you not? As for what I plan to do with the country... that shall become apparent shortly. As for what's in store for you, I can assure you that it doesn't involve your death, because quite frankly, I'm not sure if we could manage it."**

Fiyero made a face. "I'd have thought burning me would do the trick," he remarked idly.

"**True, fire would destroy your physical form- but would that guarantee the cessation of consciousness? What's to say that your mind wouldn't live on, trapped for all eternity within a heap of ashes, awake and somehow still aware of all around it?"**

With the possible exception of his stuffing, Fiyero had no blood to speak of, but that didn't stop him from feeling as though the veins he no longer owned had turned to ice. His alarm must have shown on his face, because the Nome King let out a deafening boom of laughter: **"It's certainly something to ponder, isn't it? But then, I'm sure you've had time to think on such things; that's something we immortals have in spades: time."**

"I take it that you're immortal, too, then? Oh well, I suppose the stone skin and echoey voice should have at least given me some kind of hint. Is that the same for all Nomes, or did you just earn it by becoming king?"

"**Can you picture a Nome getting old?"**

"Uh... not really."

"**Then you have you have your answer. Elemental embodiments, as a rule, do not age. Not physically, anyway."**

_You're having far too much fun for your own good, Roquat; you're obviously gearing towards something unpleasant, but what? And why are you wasting my time like this?_

"You can still be destroyed, though," he said quietly.

"**True."**

"Then I think we should start making deals about now."

"**What are your terms?"**

Fiyero drew himself up as best as he could, which wasn't too easy considering he was still tied up. But he needed to look and sound as kingly as possible for this little speech: "You can keep the emeralds," he said, in his best "diplomatic but unyielding" tone. "I couldn't care less about them. I won't ask you to rebuild anything for us, I won't ask any repayment: all I want is for you to leave Oz and release any other Ozian prisoners you have in captivity. That's all I ask."

"**And how would you ensure that I uphold my end of this deal, Fiyero? What exactly is stopping me from refusing your offer?"**

"Back when your army was tearing the Emerald City to pieces, Your Highness, I called for help: we may not have the same magical strength you possess, but we have a ritual used for contacting help, even if help lies beyond the world. Do you really want to risk coming face to face with an army from another world, one loyal to Oz?"

The Nome King smirked. **"Pardon me for being presumptuous, but that isn't what you're hoping for, is it? You're hoping that Elphaba will receive your call for help, and, following the trail of clues, eventually rain destruction down upon my kingdom, rescue you and save the day. Isn't that right?"**

"W... h... how did you- oh, don't tell me, a little bird told you. You've been spying on me, haven't you?"

"**You and all of Oz. But, as it happens, the call will not reach Elphaba... in point of fact, the call will not **_**need**_** to reach Elphaba. She's already learned of the invasion through other means, and she will soon be here- exactly as I intend. You see, Fiyero, I haven't brought you here to torture you, execute you, or convert you... you're here as **_**bait."**_

Once again, Fiyero felt as though the blood he didn't have had turned to ice. "What do you want with Elphaba?" he whispered.

"**For the same reason I have Glinda in captivity as well," **said the King, his smile broadening horribly. **"At the moment, you needn't know the exact purpose I have in mind, but know this: I was **_**intending**_** for you to call for help. You see, I've known about your emergency protocols for some time now, and I developed a method of controlling the magical signal you sent. Under my guidance, your call for help will reach the next component of my plan, and very slowly guide her back to Oz."**

"You mean-"

"**Of course. But enough about that- you wanted to know what I had in store for Oz, didn't you?"**

"I get the feeling that you haven't got anything pleasant in mind."

"**Everything dies, Fiyero," **the King intoned solemnly. **"Everything comes to dust eventually; even immortality doesn't necessarily guarantee eternal life- after all, as you've seen, we Nomes can be destroyed. As for the **_**accomplishments**_** of mortals, they last only as long as their keepers have the power to maintain them: the cities, the monuments, the knowledge recorded in books- sooner or later, it will all be reclaimed by the earth."**

"Is this going somewhere, Roquat? I've known this for quite a while, now."

The King waved a hand, and suddenly, the horns of the mountain above shimmered with magical energy: as Fiyero watched, the landscape spread out below them seemed to warp and shift, growing slowly _larger._ It took a moment or so for him to realise that a watery skein of magic had grown across the space between the horns, magnifying the distant Ozian countryside as if it were seen through an impossibly powerful telescope. Then, the magnification grew substantially: to Fiyero's eyes, it looked as though the ruined towns and farms of Munchkinland had suddenly decided to leap out of their mangled foundations and say hello.

"Shiiii!"

"**Yes, I have to agree with you there- I think I might have overdone it. Lowering magnification..."**

With another wave of the King's hand, the houses began to retreat; when the image settled, Fiyero found himself with an aerial view of Munchkinland that still provided astonishing details of the settlements below, without feeling as though he was being pressed against the windowpanes. "Nice view," he said blearily. "What exactly am I looking for?"

"**The future of Oz. You see, inevitably, plants will play a key role in destroying the remnants of mortal civilisation: they grow to strangle buildings and destroy entire cities if left to grow out of control. The process usually takes decades, sometimes even centuries... but magic, as always, offers a more entertaining alternative: for the past few hours, my soldiers have been planting seeds across Oz. Normally, it would take several years for the resulting trees and creepers to grow to full size; but, with a little bit temporal magic on my part- and few other brands of thaumaturgy- they will achieve maturity in a matter of minutes, crushing the last remnants of Ozian "culture" and hundreds of thousands of resistance groups with it."**

"Oh come on," Fiyero grumbled sceptically. "I've been around Elphaba long enough to know that you can't just fling a spell at plants spread out all over Oz and actually expect it to work. That's a whole country you're planning to alter, in case you hadn't noticed."

"**How right you are," **said the King, his voice thick with condescension. **"However, two very important factors must be taken into account: first of all, as King, I have access to vast personal reserves of magical energy. Secondly, I am in possession of two very powerful artefacts that, well..."** He chuckled. **"Actions speak louder than words, as they say. **_**Corporal**_**!"**

The face of another Nome appeared in the face of the cliff. "Yes, sir?" it said.

"**Have the Generals withdrawn their troops from the area?"**

"They have, sir, though they are asking exactly why the mop-up operations have been suspended."

"**Tell them that an explanation will be forthcoming... and to enjoy the show. Now,"** he said contemplatively, **"Where should we begin? Munchkinland? No, too easy... why don't we start with the Vinkus?"**

**

* * *

**

Rasp surveyed the growing pile of explosives and ammunition with considerable apprehension. "Are you sure that this is safe?" he asked Woolwax, who was leaning against the wall, leisurely sharpening a butcher's knife.

"From what Curter tells me, not really," he admitted. "One spark, and there won't be much left of us to bury, so I suppose I should be glad that none of us smoke."

"What are you talking about, Woolwax? I've seen you smoking!"

"That's true, but I haven't been able to find any tobacco in the last day, so there you go." He slid the butcher's knife back into his belt, stretched a moment, and then began crossing the room towards the pile. "Where's the Witch gotten to, by the way?"

"I think she's helping to unload the toolshed."

Woolwax tripped headlong over a crate of musket balls, landing with a crash among the saltpetre. _"What?"_ he yelped incredulously. "You let her out of your sight while she's doing something like _that?"_

Rasp held up a placating hand. "Relax; I haven't left her completely unsupervised, as surprising as that may seem to you. Gnoll's still keeping an eye on her."

"No offence, Governor, but Gnoll's about as useful as a chocolate kettle when it comes to guard duty. And while we're on the subject of jobs certain people aren't cut out for, _why_ would you let the Witch even _look_ at the toolshed, much less move explosives out of it?"

"Sweaty dynamite," said Rasp, obliquely.

Woolwax blinked. "Er... I did notice there were a few boxes of it in the shed, but w-"

"Out of the way, _now!"_

Completely forgetting the urge to turn around and argue, Woolwax stood aside as the Wicked Witch of the West (now known unofficially as "Miss Thropp") marched into the room, carrying a large stack of boxes. However, she wasn't carrying them in her hands: instead, they hovered eerily (and more importantly, unwaveringly) through the air less than two feet in front of her. As Woolwax watched in amazement, the stacked dynamite continued to float across the room as the Witch sat down wearily on the staircase, eventually settling in a corner of the room, where the pile couldn't collapse.

There was a long pause, as the three of them eyed the wooden boxes, and tried not to think about the explosives within, slowly oozing pure nitroglycerin. Then Gnoll finally plodded in. "Sorry about that," he mumbled. "Nobody wanted to see what would've happened if she'd dropped it."

"I can't blame them," said the Witch, glaring meaningfully at the latest addition to the munitions dump. "Is it just me, or does anyone else think we should have left that back in the shed?"

"Ah shaddup," snapped Woolwax.

"Is that _really_ all you can say to me?" the Witch shot back.

"Not now, you two," said Rasp. "But to answer your question, given our track record, I think we'd eventually figure out a way to accidentally set it off even without taking it off the shelf. Question is, who was stockpiling all this and what were they planning to use this for?"

"Maybe someone was planning on rebelling," Woolwax suggested. "The Wicked Witch of the East might be dead, but there's always someone upset with the way the country's being run."

"Oh, come on, I don't think my predecessor was doing _that_ badly-"

"Not just in Munchkinland, Governor- in all of Oz; a lot of people weren't happy about Animals being given equal rights."

"I know: I think more than half the mail we received in the last six or seven months was complaints about the new laws. Or about Glinda. But would they really go as far as using all _this_," he indicated the heap of explosives, "just to get their way?"

"Why not? The anti-Animal people sure as hell weren't above holding protest rallies against Glinda: I mean, that protest two months ago, how they were shouting about "GLINDA, LEADER OF THE ANIMAL REVOLUTION"- you remember that one? What about "GLINDA, DOOM OF HUMANITY?" The protesters there were just about ready to stage a coup d'état!"

"Woolwax, those riots happened in the _Emerald City._ If these people were planning to stage a coup, why leave the stuff _here,_ of all places?"

The argument raged on for several minutes, occasionally straying in odd directions (including suggestions that the Nomes had been pawns of the anti-Animal movements) before it reached some kind of conclusion. By then, the other refugees had returned from their explorations- each of them carrying their own payload of pilfered equipment- and decided to join the argument.

As the noise grew, Rasp gently massaged his temples and surveyed the situation: at that moment, Woolwax was nose to bellybutton with one of the two Gillikin businessmen, snarling accusations at a hundred miles an hour. Like many of Glinda's most ardent supporters, Woolwax clearly couldn't care less about the Animals; all he cared about was the slander made against Glinda the Good. The businessman, meanwhile, was a classic anti-Animal advocate, parroting every single slogan the movement had ever used- right down to "Animals Should Be Seen And Not Heard."

None of this argument was civil. In fact, the only way it really worsened was when the two debaters shifted from making wild accusations to simply threatening each other. Meanwhile, the Witch, for once completely forgotten, simply sat in a corner and watched.

Then, Woolwax made the mistake of taking a step back into accusations: "...And don't think any of us have forgotten that it was _you_ lot that accused Glinda of being an ally of the Wicked Witch of the West!"

There was an embarrassed pause, as all eyes turned in the Witch's direction. "Well," said the businessman at last, "You can't blame that on us: Glinda all but admitted it!"

"_No she didn't!"_ Woolwax roared. "She said that they met at school, and that's all!"

Another colossal silence followed, broken by Gnoll turning to the Witch and asking, "Is that true?"

The Witch scowled, and for a moment it looked as though she wasn't going to say anything. But eventually, she sighed, and said wearily, "Yes. It's true. We met exactly once at university, and never saw each other again until I publically opposed the Wizard. Happy?"

Woolwax nodded in grudging satisfaction.

As expected, however, the businessman wasn't so easily swayed: "If that's so, then why did she say that you had "wickedness thrust upon you" or whatever it was? She had a whole speech dedicated to how tough your life was, and if she hadn't been cut off, she'd have gone for hours on end. If she didn't know you that well, why'd she show sympathy?"

For a moment, the Witch's irritable scowl _flickered_, and Rasp saw an almost unreadable expression cross her face: was that shock he saw, or was it something else? Then, as if by magic, the scowl was back in place again. "As I recall," she said coldly, "that was just Glinda's way: she'd show sympathy to anyone, no matter how little she knew of them. I mean, on the day we met, she was changing her name in honour of one of the teachers..."

_Somehow,_ Rasp thought, as the Witch carried on in the background, _I get the feeling you're telling us at least _part_ of the truth._ _You have a lot of secrets, Miss Thropp; question is, will we live long enough to hear the answers?_

A loud knock on the door startled him out of his reverie, and sent the other refugees scrambling for weaponry. Woolwax, brandishing a musket, took up a firing position right in front of the door and barked "Who goes there?"

"Another survivor," a plaintive voice answered. "Could you kindly open the door? If I stay out here any longer, I'm dead- I can't run from them any longer!"

"Who are you running from, the Nomes?"

"Bugger the Nomes!" wailed the stranger. "I lost them over ten miles back. It's the bloody Wheelers who're after me now!"

After several more cacophonous thuds at the door and a sudden argument over whether or not they should let the stranger in, Woolwax hesitantly opened the door to reveal...

Rasp blinked, mentally assessed what little he knew of non-local Animal species, and decided that- given the hooves, the slender frame, and the long, backward-curling horns- it was probably a gazelle. Regardless of who or what he was, the anti-Animal activists among the refugees immediately began shouting their disgust; one of them even tried to force Woolwax to shut the door- to no avail, as for once, Woolwax appeared to be strictly neutral.

"I won't have that thing in here!" shouted the businessman, blocking the Gazelle's way into the house. "It's probably a spy for the Nomes!"

"Nor I! I won't stand for having an Animal among us!"

"Get that goat out of the door!"

The Animal glared at the speaker. "I'm a _Gazelle,_" he said pointedly. "And would you mind making up your minds soon, before the Wheelers catch up with me and kill us all?"

"Look," said Rasp diplomatically, "Let's just let him in for the moment, and we'll decide what to do once we're sure that we're not in any danger. How does that sound?"

The Anti-Animal campaigners in the crowd roared in disapproval.

"Let him in," said a voice from the back of the entrance hall; it was the Witch, once again almost forgotten about in the chaos. Something had changed in her demeanour: in the last few hours, she'd seemed largely chaotic in temperament, flicking between disinterest, annoyance and anger seemingly at the drop of a hat; now, her voice was eerily calm and her face set in a deeply tranquil mask- except for her eyes, which looked as though they could slice through flesh and bone with a single glare. And the air around her, too, had changed; it seemed to crackle with palpable energy that set Rasp's teeth on edge and made the hairs on his arms stand up. Was the Witch about to cast a spell?

Several people noticed, and backed away from her. Only two people failed to notice: the Gazelle, who was too busy staring at the Witch with an expression of shock etched on his face, and the businessman, who was doing his very best to put on a brave face. "If you think I'm going to take orders from the Wicked Witch of the-" he began.

"Of course not," she said icily. "You're going to let that Gazelle into this house, and you're going to do it because you're an upstanding, high-minded gentleman who cares deeply for those in need. And," she added, her lips curling upward into a ghastly grin, "Because I'll kill you very slowly if you don't."

A tendril of lightning crackled across her fingertips.

The businessman paled, and stepped away from the door, allowing the Gazelle to canter inside. As he passed the Witch, he mumbled a "Thankyou," and ducked gratefully into the shadows of the entrance hall. Then, as Woolwax (who was looking almost amused by the proceedings) began bolting the door, there came a deafening chorus of cackling laughs and squealing wheels, as whatever had been chasing the hapless Gazelle thundered into earshot.

As the sounds drew closer, Woolwax opened one of the nearest windows (inward-opening, thankfully) and peered cautiously through the gaps between the boards. "Yeah," he muttered. "It's definitely Wheelers. I've seen 'em before, but never this badly-dressed."

"Is it _just_ Wheelers?" Rasp asked; having read far too many reports by local guardsmen, he knew that it wasn't likely that the Wheelers would be able to break down the door without help.

"No; they're pulling some kind of chariot behind them. Here, you take a look..." Woolwax shuffled to the side as Rasp leaned towards the improvised peephole to look: he saw that there were no less than twenty-five Wheelers rumbling down the path at that moment- fifteen pulling an impressive-looking gold chariot, the remaining ten acting as bodyguards to the chariot's occupant, a tall blonde-haired woman dressed in shimmering crimson robes.

As Rasp watched apprehensively, the Witch (still followed by the crossbow-toting Gnoll) opened the window across from him and stared out at the approaching Wheelers. Then, she muttered, "Damn it, _her_ again."

Rasp was about to ask exactly what she meant by that, when the chariot came to a grinding halt less than six feet from the front door, and one of the Wheelers shouted, "In the name of Her Most Authoritative Majesty, Princess Mombi, I hereby declare all surviving Munchkins..." There was a pause, as the Wheeler hastily checked the paper tied to his front leg. "... property of the state... and to that end, demand that you open the door and surrender yourselves immediately!"

The silence that followed was almost deafening, and after a good eight seconds of it, Rasp turned around and realised that everyone, including the Witch, was looking at him. Of course, this wasn't the first time he'd ended up on the receiving end of an expectant stare; when he and four other members of the Governor's staff had found their employer's corpse spread from one end of his ruined office to the next, everyone had turned to him, all of them silently asking him what they were going to do next. And he'd done well enough, so far, hadn't he? He'd led them out of the blazing ruins of the Governor's home, he'd found other survivors, and they'd managed to survive well enough so far. They'd even managed to capture the Wicked Witch of the West.

If he could only feel as though it _wasn't_ based entirely on luck...

_And your luck can't last forever, Quintether old boy. You're not a leader, you're not a diplomat, and you're not a strategist: you're a bureaucrat, and this is no time to get overconfident._

Of course, this was no time to get _underconfident_, either. So, Rasp took a breath to steady himself, stepped towards the door, and said in a loud, clear voice, "As Acting Governor of Munchkinland, and being privy to the 22nd Military Defence Law Amendment , Section 11, Paragraph B, I'm less than inclined to obey that order."

"Well," said the Wheeler, "We shall have to... hang on a minute, what _is_ the 22nd Military Defence Law Amendment, Section 11 Paragraph B?"

"To cut a long story short, it forbids me from surrendering to any army that can be defeated by a closed door. And," he continued, over the Witch's sniggering, "It also forbids me from surrendering to armies that can't batter down a door without concussing themselves."

"Speciesist bastard," growled the Wheeler. "You're dead. And you tell that Gazelle he's dead, too- we're going to barbecue him alive, the rotten cud-eating- OW!"

"That's enough from you," said an imperious voice; a quick look through the peephole revealed that this voice belonged to the tall, blonde woman standing in the chariot. "Now, _you_ in there open the door this instant or I'll blast it off its hinges and make you eat the splinters. And believe me, that'll just be the _start_ of what I'll do to you and those fools lurking behind you. I will use your blood to paint the bedroom walls of my palace; I will use your skin as a blanket..."

"Do you mind if I take over from here?" the Witch asked quietly. "I've had to deal with this maniac before, and believe me, she can carry on for hours."

Rasp nodded, and the Witch strode over to the door, and shouted, "You're sounding much hoarser today, Mombi. Did you cut a little too close to the vocal cords this time?"

There was strangled choking noise from outside. "Thropp?" Mombi yelped. "What... what are you doing _here?_ You should have arrived at the Nome King's Mountain ages ago!"

"Aha!" said Elphaba triumphantly. "I thought you surrendered the information a little too readily. So, does the King have a trap set especially for me, or does he have something worse in mind?"

Mombi hesitated. "Who said I did that any of that under the King's orders?" she eventually answered. "Who says I didn't just send you in that direction just to get rid of you?"

"Because," said the Witch smugly, "To be brutally honest, I don't think you're nearly smart enough to pull off such a feint. Come to think of it, I don't think you're smart enough to handle an axe without hurting yourself; so I have to ask- just how many of your toes did you remove while collecting those heads of yours?"

"Damn you, Thropp, I'll take you to the Nome King myself if I have to! I'll bring the roof down on your head and drag your carcass out of the wreckage and take it all the way to the Mountain... _once I've finished kicking your teeth out! _I'll tie your hands with your own oesophagus and your legs with your optic nerve! I'll make your kidneys into a waistcoat for my lead Wheeler! I'll spike your eyes and use them as earrings! I'll wear your pancreas around my neck as a medallion, you talentless faux-prodigy! And then, _then_ I'll get violent..."

"Talentless faux-prodigy?" echoed the Witch. "Do I detect a hint of jealousy in your voice, Mombi?"

"And did this woman study medical textbooks for these threats?" Rasp whispered snidely.

"I HEARD THAT, YOU LITTLE TURD! YOU'D BEST STAND AWAY FROM THE DOOR, BECAUSE I WANT YOU ALIVE! I WANT YOU _PARBOILED ALIVE!"_

"Your Majesty," said one of the Wheelers urgently, "Something's wrong- it's the plants-"

Over Mombi's screamed a reprimand, Rasp clearly heard the sound of the other Wheelers honking in alarm, and hurried to the peephole to see what had spooked them: it didn't take long for him to see that all eyes were focussed on the nearest patch of vegetation. There was a sapling there, and Rasp briefly wondered when it had been planted, because as far as he could remember, it hadn't been there when they had first approached the manor. But then he realised that what had shocked the Wheelers was the fact that it was now growing at an incredible rate, stretching dramatically towards the sky and sending its thickening roots coursing through the soil. And there were more saplings growing, too...

On every single patch of soil in sight, from the grounds of the manor to the ruined landscape beyond, young saplings were bursting free of the earth and growing into trees, tearing apart any building unlucky enough to be in the way. Judging by the flow of expletives, Mombi had realised that the trees appeared to be growing inwards towards the garden path- and her chariot. One of the Wheelers clearly recognised this as well, and began frantically rolling towards the gate, only for a newly-grown root to burst out of the earth and impale him neatly through the chest: down he went, instantly covered in layer after layer of hungry roots, his screaming at first muffled then silenced forever as he was crushed into the soil.

"Thropp!" Mombi yelled, her voice suddenly panicked. "Whatever you're doing, stop it now!"

"Sorry, Mombi," said the Witch, and it might have been Rasp's imagination, but she sounded genuinely surprised. "I'm not working any magic at present."

"I'm not stupid, you know- I recognise a tailor-made spell when I see it, and these things aren't touching your house!"

"True, but I haven't cast any spells in the last few minutes."

"Then who..." Mombi turned, and realised that most of her bodyguards were already fleeing for their lives as the ravenous trees grew ever closer. "...RETREAT!" she howled. "RETREAT!" And the Wheelers still harnessed took off so quickly that Mombi was almost thrown from the chariot as it lurched away, bouncing violently over the new roots and the four dead Wheelers that they'd claimed. Eventually, the screams and thuds were drowned out by the crunching sounds of rapidly-growing trees, and the thunderous booms of ruined houses being torn to pieces.

"Thank Goodness for that," Woolwax sighed, mopping his brow. He turned to the Witch, and said- with great difficulty-, "Well done. When's it going to stop?"

The Witch smiled sheepishly. "I don't know. When I said I didn't cast any spells, I was telling the truth."

"Come on, woman, don't mess about-"

"I'm not messing about! I don't know who cast this spell, but it sure as hell wasn't me!"

"Oh really?" said the Gillikin businessman. "Can you prove that?"

"No, but-"

"Are you trying to kill us?"

"Don't be an idiot; the trees haven't touched the house-"

"GNOLL!" The guard obediently snapped to attention, shouldering his crossbow. "Right," snarled the businessman, "You've got ten seconds to stop this; if those trees haven't stopped growing in those ten seconds, Gnoll is going to shoot you in the heart- if you even have one!" There was a shout of agreement from the surrounding refugees.

"Hang on!" said Rasp indignantly. "Have you forgotten who's in charge here? I'm the governor, _I _give the orders!"

"And what's the order, you pretentious little bastard?" The businessman drewa flintlock pistol from his coat and pointed it squarely at Rasp. "Kowtow to the Wicked Witch of the West? Take orders from the woman who- for all we know- might have been behind this invasion to begin with? I'm starting to think you trust her a little too much for your own good."

"Oh for Oz's sake, have you completely lost your mind? I'm not on her side... and if you keep waving that gun around the munitions, I won't be on _anyone's_ side!"

The businessman took a deep breath. "Fair enough," he conceded, pocketing the flintlock. "Gnoll, shoot her."

"But-"

"NOW!"

Almost on instinct, Gnoll fired his crossbow; in the fraction of a second before the bolt reached her, the Witch suddenly waved a hand, sending the deadly missile rocketing away to the left, where it embedded itself harmlessly in the wall.

Outside, the rumblings of growing trees suddenly stopped, and in the ringing silence that they left behind, the Witch spoke in a low, menacing voice. "All of you listen to me now: I know you're not interested in my explanations, but I'm going to tell you anyway; and since I know for an indisputable fact that none of you would believe me if I told you I did anything out of the goodness of my heart, so I won't bother with that tall tale. Long story short, I'm not an idiot: if I _had_ cast the spell and set it to destroy the house as well, I'd end up getting ripped to pieces along with you."

"There's another thing here we need to get straight: I'm not your prisoner. In the last two days, I could have left the camp and just walked away. I'm staying with you because I need your help, because as much as I'd like to think otherwise, I can't carry out a raid on the Nome King's mountain all by myself. Try and take that as a _compliment." _She let her breath hiss outwards at long last. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to find a bed that isn't infested with spiders and get some rest. In the meantime, you've got a brainstorming session with your Governor to work on: we've got a lot of ground to cover, and it's all forested."

And with that, the Wicked Witch turned on her heel and marched up the stairs, into the darkness, Gnoll struggling to keep up.

* * *

Hundreds of miles away, Fiyero hung limply from his scaffolding, unable to take his eyes off the tide of destruction sweeping across Oz, crushing everything in its path: buildings, people, even trees already growing in the affected areas were torn apart or buried by the swift growth of new trees. After the first ten minutes of watching, he'd stopped howling abuse at the Nome King, and simply watched in horror and disbelief as Oz virtually fell apart before his eyes.

"**Quite a sight,"** said the King, softly. **"I don't think any event of this kind has been seen in millennia."**

"You bastard," said Fiyero, hoarsely.

"**Doubtful. If it's any comfort to you, there will be survivors; there are **_**always**_** survivors."**

"Not for long, not at the rate you're destroying the country," he laughed bitterly. "Big mistake there: that slaving run you've probably got planned next will be a hell of a lot harder now that you've got the survivors spread even wider across the country, won't it?"

"**If you want my opinion, Fiyero, _your _mistake was bothering to care: I think you could do with a bit of the callousness you had in the old days, don't you?"**

"Go chew on a stick of dynamite."

The Nome King tut-tutted disapprovingly. **"I think you need some time alone with your thoughts, young immortal. Guards!"** A pair of hulking Nome guards materialised at either wall of the two pinnacles, bowing low as they approached the King. **"Take his Highness back to the cells... but this time, put him next to PINHEAD. will you?"**

As the guards indelicately dragged him out of the scaffolding, Fiyero wondered absently who this Pinhead was and what he'd done to earn himself a stay in the Nome King's dungeons; after all, it was better than thinking about the chaos he'd just witnessed. _Anything_ was better than thinking about that...

So, when the Nomes finally dragged him into the darkness, he was still daydreaming, still inventing the character of Pinhead and still imagining how the two of them would be rescued by Elphaba.

_Elphaba,_ he wondered, as the tunnel closed behind him, _I really hope you're prepared when the time comes..._


	14. Rebukes and Rewards

A/N: Well, here we are with a new chapter at long last. Fair warning, though, ladies and gents: we've got Mombi again in this chapter, followed by the perspective of a heretofore unexplored original character; if neither of these are your thing, this chapter may hurt. Sorry.

Now that the public service announcement is out of the way, read, review and enjoy!

Disclaimer: I do not own Wicked. Contrary to the evidence, it doesn't own me, either.

* * *

"Damn you," Mombi snarled, her eyes blazing with unspent magic. "Where are you? Why are you wasting my time like this? _Answer me!_"

Mombi was in a very bad mood that evening: intending to parade grandly into one of the many territories that she and the Nomes had so easily conquered and take her due quota of slaves, she had ended up fleeing for her life across a landscape that had turned traitor. She'd lost at least half of her entourage- both steeds and bodyguards- and most of her magnificent gold chariot had been all but ripped apart by the multitudes of trees shooting through the ground in front of it _and_ beneath it. For hours, she'd sped back across the newly-unrecognisable countryside on two battered gold wheels, dodging growths of new forest and trying not to fall off, her exhausted Wheelers motivated only by heart-freezing terror and the occasional blast of lightning.

Less than half an hour ago, they'd crashed back through the fresh undergrowth and over the tumbledown gates of the Emerald City, and by then, Mombi's terror had given way to rage; she'd had time to guess at what had caused the impossible growth of plants, and knew that there was only one being with the magical knowledge of such a spell and the power to cast it upon such a large area: the Nome King. So, still smouldering with frustration, she'd all but leapt from the chariot, kicked aside the exhausted bodies of her surviving entourage, and stomped towards the city square, intent on giving her erstwhile benefactor an earful.

The other Wheelers, having learned to recognise one of their mistress's temper tantrums on sight, had sensibly decided to stay as far away from her as possible, slinking towards the shadows with their coat-tails tucked firmly between their legs and warning each other to stay as far from the city square as possible.

Days ago, the Nome King had converted the town square into an unofficial signalling ground, to be used in the event of "serious developments." Mombi had heard the Nome King's list of events that qualified as serious developments, but as far as she was concerned, if almost getting shredded to compost by an unexpected growth of forest didn't qualify as a serious development, _nothing_ did. So, as soon as she'd arrived at the very centre of the cratered square, she'd began chanting the words of Summoning... and waited for the next five minutes as the magic signal echoed across the country.

"Come on!" she fumed. "I know you've heard me, you old fossil; why are you wasting my time like this?"

There was a low rumbling noise from behind her and, just as Mombi belatedly realised that the directions had insisted that she face northwest while summoning, a familiar voice remarked, **"Wasting your time like **_**what,**_** my dear?"**

As expected, the Nome King was standing there, his normally mountainous form exchanged for a roughly human-sized figure. He wasn't alone, however: on either side of him stood two slightly smaller Nomes- one a soldier, the other a servant. Mombi's ego was briefly mollified by the fact that the King had actually been cowardly enough to bring bodyguards to this meeting; then, it began to howl for blood again: "I just got back from a tour of Munchkinland," she snapped. "It was supposed to have been a simple visit to newly-conquered territory, to inspire fear among the locals!"

"**Is that so? I seem to recall that you were only supposed to signal me in the event of serious development."**

"This _is_ a serious development, you clod! I'd barely gotten through introducing myself as their new ruler when_ a small forest sprung up and ate half my retinue_- and don't think I don't know it was your fault, either, you sneaky little bastard! I barely escaped with my life! I could have been _minced!_ What were you thinking?"

The Nome King waited patiently for Mombi to finish shouting, his fingers steepled, a polite smile curling his stone lips. As soon as the echoes died away, he gently cleared his throat, and remarked, **"That's all very well and good, but I'm still waiting for you to tell me all about this serious development... unless, of course, I missed it amidst all the swearing."**

"You _son of a bitch! _You dirty, backstabbing, murderous, condescending heap of topsoil! You almost killed me! And let's not forget that you've just rendered all the territory I'd hope to settle completely useless! It's all forest now and all because you couldn't bear to let me have what I'd earned fair and square!"

A quizzical look crossed the King's face. **"I do beg your pardon- senility does creep up on me at times- but I could have sworn that our original agreement didn't bequeath you any territory beyond the Emerald City."**

"It was my right!" Mombi shrieked. "_I_ gave you support! _I _gave you the Wheelers!_ I _led my own attack! _I_ petrified the Tin Man _and _the Lion! That territory was mine by right of conquest, and you had no right to take it from me-"

Without dropping his smile, the Nome King reached out, fastened one dinner plate-sized hand on Mombi's right shoulder, and squeezed. _Hard._ **"I could be mistaken,"** he said, raising his voice over the resultant scream, **"But you appear to be labouring under the belief that you're being mistreated. Do you feel you're being mistreated, Mombi? I can't imagine why: I was very generous when I granted you governance of the Emerald City."**

"But- AAAAARGH- it's ruined! It's useless! I can't do anythinnnnnngggg..."

"**Really, Mombi, I'd have expected so much more from a human of your talents; a few spells here and there, some careful transfiguration of this rubble, and I think you'd have some very suitable building materials. But then, you've got more important things to do: you've got mirrors to admire, heads to collect, and of course, the tasks I assigned you- none of which you can perform while you're in Munckinland, bullying the natives."** He suddenly released his grip on Mombi's shoulder, roughly shoving her to the ground in the process; he was no longer smiling, but the frown he wore showed no signs of anger or hatred- just mild annoyance, with a hint of paternal disapproval. **"From now on, you pretentious little coprolite," **he continued chidingly,** "I expect you to perform your duties without a word of complaint- lest I decide to give one of your collection a chance at governorship."**

"Oh really?" sneered Mombi, just managing to recapture a shred of her confidence; she had to hold on to that arrogance, because she knew now that the two Nomes flanking the King weren't bodyguards but _spectators: _she was being humiliated before the very eyes of the Nome Kingdom, and she needed to save what little face she had left before it all trickled away. "I hardly think you can just give these heads a semblance of will, your highness, not without _my _permission."

There was a dangerous pause, and then a voice said, "Would you look at that- I think he managed it!"

Mombi blinked, and realised that the voice had emerged from her own lips- or rather, from the head she was currently wearing.

"**I trust I don't have to speculate aloud upon what Miss Mutius might do if she had **_**your**_** head in a cabinet and not the other way around, do I?"**

"But-"

"**Soccer, I'd think. Perhaps bowling. Maybe she's a golfer, I don't know. I suppose a human eyeball **_**could**_** fit on a golf tee-"**

"Enough! Enough! I get the picture!"

"**Remember, Mombi, I can make hilariously unrealistic threats as well. Trouble is, when I make them, they have a nasty habit of coming true..." **The Nome King chuckled darkly to himself.** "So, if you've no further reason to waste my time, I believe I shall depart. Don't forget those duties of yours, my dear..."**

As the King and his entourage vanished beneath the broken flagstones, Mombi breathed a sigh of relief, and sat down heavily on a fallen length of column, and tried to stop herself from trembling. She'd had never been so thoroughly reprimanded since her days at Shiz, back when she was still under Madame Morrible's tutelage; but then, this was different- Morrible had never pretended to be her ally; Morrible had never approved of her studies into youth-extensions and beauty potions, or her political views, or the company she kept; as a matter of fact, Morrible had never approved of anything she had ever done in her time at Shiz.

_And look who her favourite pupil turned out to be- a green-skinned tart born with just the right amount of luck and talent to get Horrible Morrible's attention! Bitch._

Her hatred flared wildly, and she tried to think of something else. Then, her eyes- though blurry with tears of humiliation- managed to focus on the gaudily-dressed Wheeler staring at her...

_A Wheeler who'd been listening to her argument with the King..._

She was already on her feet again and charging by the time the thought had ground to a halt in her mind; before the eavesdropper could pick up adequate speed to escape, she was upon him, hauling him upright by the collar and shaking him violently.

"You," she snarled, and to her shame, she realised that her voice was still quivering. Determined not to lose forward momentum, she continued, snarling, "You breathe one word of... of w-what you have heard here, I'm going to... I'll take your... your... and..." Her imagination had run dry. She tried again: "Pain! You will be in a lot of pain! Lots and lots of spine-shredding pain!I will use your spine as a javelin to kill whoever you told, and if they've told anyone else, I'll..." She gave up. "JUST GO AWAY!"

And even as the Wheeler fled, Mombi's brain was already frantically reciting a desperate mantra of all that had gone wrong: _the territory I wanted is gone, the Nome King doesn't trust me, he can have any one of my heads take control of me whenever he pleases, and on top of that, my Wheelers know all about it. _

_What am I going to do?_

_Stupid question, Mombi: you're going to find something to soothe the bruising around your shoulder. Damnation, did the rotten bastard really have to grip so _hard_?_

* * *

Fifty miles from the ruins of the Emerald City, two hundred and seventy feet beneath the earth, the Nome King's mind roamed freely through the dense rock, occasionally claiming just enough of a body to peer above ground before abandoning it once again and continuing on towards the Mountains. With the Nome corporal having long since swum off to report to the generals, Basalt's own consciousness was left to hurry after the King, trying valiantly not to fall behind; had anyone been able to see the two of them and even comprehend what they were looking at, the spectacle would have resembled a goldfish trying to keep pace with a blue whale.

"**A bizarre creature, wouldn't you say, Basalt?"** the Nome King boomed softly.

Basalt offered the incorporeal equivalent of a shrug. "I would not know, Your Majesty; I have had very little experience with mortals, and as such, I cannot comprehend their intellectual processes."

"**Who can? Mombi isn't the best template for mortal behaviour, however; by more enlightened standards, she'd be criminally insane. But to be honest, she's not the one I'm worried about; I believe we have more to fear from the generals of the War Council."**

This made no sense to Basalt; the generals were military representatives of the King's himself, bound by oath to serve him and Nomekind, so how could they be any threat? As he puzzled over this one, the King explained. **"Now that they are returning to the dominions en mass to discuss strategy with me, sooner or later, they're going to realise what I have planned for Glinda, and they're going insist on her execution."**

"But you have the authority to veto their demands, Your Majesty."

"**That doesn't stop them from ordering an assassination while I'm still working out the latter stages of the strategy,"** the King pointed out.

It is a universally recognised fact among Nomes that underprivileged servants cannot feel or express shock; nonetheless, this didn't stop Basalt from abruptly grinding to a halt right in the middle of the bedrock and trying vainly to comprehend what the King had just told him. Eventually, the King backtracked to explain: **"Basalt," **he said, in a lecturing tone,** "you seem to be under the impression that the Generals are a principled cabal of military leaders elected to serve my interests and the needs of our people; unfortunately, they are also the proud owners of all the privileges afforded to our kind, coupled with all the obstinacy that three and a half millennia in office can bring. In all honesty, they're a ravening pack of power-hungry bastards that would collapse the very mountains if it meant keeping their authority. In other words, they need to be kept out of the loop; I can delay their return, but I can't keep them out of the palace forever. And in the event that they find out about Glinda, she will be dead in a matter of hours."**

It was impossible for Basalt to feel concern, but nonetheless, he did feel a vague sense of unease at this concept; after all, he had been declared Glinda's bodyguard, and as such, he'd been tasked with the duty of serving and protecting her.

"**The solution is quite simple however: you're to be promoted."**

Basalt didn't know how to respond to this inexplicable suggestion, so he remained silent as the King elaborated. **"If I were to grant you the station of Protector, you'd be due the privileges of curiosity and initiative- exactly what you'd need to seek out threats to Glinda's life and eliminate them without wasting precious time getting permission. How does that sound?"**

He waited patiently for the natural response to voice itself, for from the moment a Nome's consciousness first tumbled into reality, it instinctively sought out means of self-improvement.

Hundreds of thousands of years ago, the primitive earth spirits that they had been watched the sentients dwelling above them and observed that these creatures of flesh looked upon the world much differently. For centuries, they'd pondered the mysteries of emotion, imagination, and self-motivated reasoning, but it wasn't until one of these primeval beings, a pioneer among his kind, had taken steps to magically harness this "oddness" that they truly grasped the facts: at that moment, they'd stopped being a hive mind of crude spirits feeding blindly on whatever crossed their path, and started being a hierarchy of _Nomes_. Possessed of emotions and the ability to bestow them on whoever he pleased, the pioneer, as the first individual among his fellows, became the first King of a new species; as he restructured his people, he implanted them with the urge to attain the same gifts he had achieved- but through dedicated service, and not magical experimentation.

And now, Basalt was felling that same urge. The privilege he would receive fascinated him, in his own bland way. Along with curiosity, he would be given Initiative- the power to act _without being told what to do_, a power that some found almost impossible to comprehend.

How could any Nome resist?

"Most welcome, Your Majesty," he intoned.

* * *

Basalt's memories of his ceremonial promotion were hazy: he recalled the King, once again inhabiting a body, holding out a hand that was swarming with the energies that contained his next two privileges. Then, he lost consciousness.

He awoke a few minutes later, feeling as though he'd been wearing manacles for most of his life and had only just been released from them. With only the command of "seek out any threats to Glinda's life" to follow, he took to his new initiative with a certain degree of trepidation, not being certain what he'd look for; for more than half an hour, he paced around Glinda's room, walking in and out of walls and occasionally checking the occupant's life signs as he tried to think of what to do next.

Then he remembered the King telling him about the return of the Generals, and without warning his newfound initiative flared to life: after ten minutes of thinking harder than he'd ever thought before, he found himself searching the palace for any sign of their arrival, from the rooms that could only be inhabited by Nomes, to those suited to humans- which were becoming increasingly common for some reason. Then, taking advantage of his new authority, he asked a few of the guards to alert him if any generals were to arrive; then, he sent a message to several spies on the Ozian border, ordering them to contact him if the generals were seen crossing. Finally, he hurried back to Glinda's room to make sure that no assassination attempts had been made.

Once Basalt was sure that nothing was amiss, he stood outside and leaned against the wall, exhausted for the first time in his life... and awed by what he had felt: he'd just accomplished three tasks without being told to do so and without asking permission. And these tasks had been devised almost entirely by himself_; _other than "seek out any threats to Glinda's life," he'd been given no explicit commands.

He felt weary, he felt bewildered, and most of all, he felt absurdly powerful.

Once he'd recovered his equilibrium and stopped wondering about how mortals enjoyed _their_ personal initiative, he re-entered the cell to make inquiries about Glinda's health. He found her seated at the desk, reading through the Grimmerie and taking notes. Though she appeared healthy enough (as far as Basalt could tell) she was muttering faintly under her breath; he managed to discern the words "you can do this," and "Elphaba's waiting..."

Basalt had heard the name "Elphaba" before: when the King had first brought Glinda to the Nome dominions, the two of them had used the name frequently, apparently referring to a human woman of some importance, but now deceased- apparently melted- and the King had been offering a way of travelling back in time and saving her. None of this made any sense to Basalt, especially the way Glinda had been obsessing over her, unless Basalt had missed something vital in the conversation- not entirely implausible, since he'd been averting his eyes and ears from most of it out of deference to the King.

Who was Elphaba, and what made her so important that Glinda would be willing to assist one of her enemies to try and save her life? More importantly, would this obsession develop into "insanity" and would Glinda remain useful to the King in such a state?

So, once he'd made sure that Glinda wasn't feeling any sickness or discomfort, he asked, "If you do not mind my asking, Miss Glinda, who is Elphaba?"

Glinda frowned; according to Basalt's associates among the higher ranks, (low-privilege Nomes didn't have friends) this could indicate a number of emotions, including "annoyance" and "sorrow." Either could be possible, as far as Basalt's limited understanding of them went.

"Hasn't your boss told you everything about her?" she snapped. She sounded "annoyed."

"No, Miss."

"Alright then, in that case, haven't you got _anything_ better to do other than ask me stupid questions?"

"No Miss: I have completed all my set tasks for today, save for ensuring your health. I do not wish to intrude..."

Glinda sighed wearily. "No, it's fine. I suppose it might help if I talk about it..."

Over the course of the next three quarters of an hour, she told him everything she knew about Elphaba, beginning with how they'd first met at "university." A great deal of it had been beyond Basalt's understanding, as he'd had no comparisons to draw on: he had no idea why abnormal skin colour would be any grounds for discrimination, the concept of schools and state-enforced learning baffled him, and he found the details behind human families downright grotesque. At one point, he'd asked if they could stop for a minute while he tried to process the reason for Nessarose' "wheelchair."

Thankfully, once that was over and done with, Glinda began to talk about things that made a certain degree of sense: her reverence for Elphaba seemed justified when she told him of her rebellion against the Wizard, and her magical powers- a sign of greatness among the higher Nomes- only seemed to elevate her further. Basalt listened with great interest as Glinda told him of Elphaba's last days, her reaction to the deaths of Nessarose and FIyero, and her death by a bucket of water, a substance that she was apparently allergic to.

Once she had finished explaining, Basalt thanked her for the information, and politely departed; though still learning the intricacies of human emotions, he'd noticed an expression on Glinda's face that might have been "sorrow."

Besides, something she'd said had piqued his newfound curiosity...

It took him some time to find a book on human anatomy in the palace library (what with the high-ranking librarian gawping at him), and even longer to read it. But once he was finished, he returned to Glinda's cell, bowed, and whispered, "Sorry to disturb you again, Miss Glinda, but I must ask one more question about Elphaba."

Glinda shrugged. "Go ahead."

"Did Elphaba have any scars around her eyes, or suffer burns or irritations around them?"

Glinda blinked, evidently nonplussed. "No."

"Did you ever see her crying?"

"No; Elphaba kept her emotions very firmly bottled away. Even when she let me actually know how sad she was, she didn't cry."

Basalt thanked her once again, and rumbled away.

* * *

If Glinda's testimony was to be believed, Elphaba had not suffered any burns or other injuries to the area around her eyes, nor had there been any visible scars present there.

However, according to the medical textbook, human tears were composed of water- a substance that had _melted_ Elphaba.

And Glinda had never seen her friend shedding tears.

More to the point, how had anyone discovered this lethal allergy in the first place? Had anyone in Oz witnessed any instance of it before her death? What did it all mean, what did it add up to?

Even as Basalt prowled the Dominions, searching for threats to Glinda's life, the questions dogged him; he needed to find the answers- so long as they didn't interfere with his duties, of course.

Perhaps the spies would know; after all, the King had been using them to spy on Elphaba.

Or, perhaps the Scarecrow- one of Elphaba's murderers- would know the answer...


	15. Flying Keys and Flying Carpets

A/N: Sorry for the long wait, but with my workload, finding time to write has been something of a problem. Hopefully, the next chapter will be uploaded a bit faster, and it'll be much less of a breather episode than this one... In the meantime, read, review and enjoy!

Disclaimer: Wicked is not and never will be owned by Straightjacketed.

* * *

In the chaotic aftermath of the Nome Invasion, the Scarecrow's emergency ritual had been somewhat overlooked by the new rulers of the country: to the rank and file, it was insignificant compared to their duties. To the Nomes privileged enough to think about such things, it was curious, but ultimately unimportant. To the War Council, it was one last attempt by the defeated enemy to summon reinforcements, and since the reinforcements hadn't arrived, why should they worry? Even the Nome King was too preoccupied with his "guests" to bother with it.

However, unlike the others, the Nome King had known where the key was due to reappear; after all, he'd redirected its path through the ether sometime after the ritual was first performed. He also knew that the key had thousands upon thousands of miles to travel before it arrived at its destination, so he'd busied himself with the business of converting Glinda and disciplining Fiyero, waiting for the magical signal to finally ground itself.

But at long last, it had almost completed its journey, and two disembodied psyches raced to survey it- each for their own reasons:

The first was, of course, the Nome King; eager to keep an eye on his investments, he'd decided that this one was at least worth the effort of casting his mind across the worlds, if only to ensure that it had arrived safely. Of course the sheer distance between Oz and the Other world meant that he could only influence it in the tiniest of ways; however, he could still observe, and that would be enough- for now.

The second of the two was trapped inside the mirrors of Mombi's throne room, her consciousness sealed in by layer after layer of complicated enchantments and prevented from scrying the Land of Oz for help. However, she'd found that though it was impossible to cast her mind outwards through the barriers, her consciousness could drift upon the magical signal that the ritual had sent. Like the Nome King, her influence over this world was limited- even more so than that of the King- but if it allowed her escape, she would endure it.

Their journey through the earthly barriers eventually brought them to a wide expanse of countryside, bathed in moonlight and unbroken by any sign of civilisation except for a lonely-looking farm and a long stretch of dirt road.

It didn't seem the most auspicious place for the key to land, but the Nome King had been surveying this land for almost five months, searching for the third and final component of his plan- no easy task, but he'd found her. S_he_ was to find the key; she was to recognize it as a message from the Scarecrow, and with some magical assistance, follow the trail of breadcrumbs all the way to the Emerald City, where Mombi would keep her safely contained until the other components were in place and prepared. With all the elements arrayed and the understudies prepared to continue the transformation should anything go wrong, the ritual would begin; and _then_…

A pulse of magic shocked him out of his reverie, and he looked up to see the key, glowing cherry-red from the touch of magic, tumbling through the night sky. He chuckled excitedly, knowing that another piece of the puzzle was slowly falling into place.

Some distance away, the ethereal form of the second observer could only stare at the key as it passed and wonder what would happen next.

And inside the half-built farmhouse, a little girl was staring out the window. She'd been lying awaking in bed, trying to lull herself to sleep with thoughts of a world she longed to return to, a world which nobody else could believe in; it wouldn't work, and she knew it- she'd only been able to catch a few hours of uninterrupted sleep a night, and it was getting worse every week. But anything was better than thinking about the doctor that she was to be sent to; she hadn't understood half of what had been said about the "treatment," but she knew that it was supposed to be For Her Own Good, to stop All Those Horrid Waking Dreams and All This Talk Of Ruby Slippers, and none of that sounded especially promising.

So, with so many concerns in mind, she found herself eagerly sitting up in bed to stare at the glowing shape rocketing through the air; she paused, and turned to the dog asleep at her feet. "A shooting star, Toto," she whispered excitedly, for once not even caring that she was in a world where animals couldn't talk, "A shooting star!"

* * *

Elphaba's eyes creaked open; once she'd conjured a light and the memories of the previous evening permeated her brain, she found herself back in the dilapidated bedroom she'd cloistered herself in. This, at least, was familiar- not just because she'd chosen it as a means of isolating herself from the other refugees, but because this room had once belonged to her.

Oh yes, as much as people had liked to joke about it when she was a kid, she hadn't spent the first six years of her life bricked up in a secret room on the mansion's west wing. Of course, given her reputation, the room hadn't been touched since the day she'd left for Shiz. Everything had been left as it was; the bed, the books on the one shelf, the chest of drawers- even the clothes inside the drawers hadn't been disturbed by human hands. Unfortunately, this meant that the dust, the insects and the spiders had been given free reign over the room, so Elphaba had spent almost half an hour clearing the room before finally lying down on the freshly-cleansed bed to sleep.

All in all, the room was just as comfortably frugal as it had been in the past, which was probably why Gnoll- who was still acting as an unofficial guard- had decided to spend his evening on duty sitting on the floor, where he'd promptly fallen asleep. Clambering sleepily out of bed, she stood and stretched for a minute, immediately shivering in the cold night air; after finding and donning her cloak, she stepped carefully over Gnoll's prone body and tiptoed out of the room in search of warmth.

Downstairs, the other refugees were clustered around a fireplace in the lounge, having apparently managed to clear the chimney of debris and get a fire started in the grate. They were now gathered around it, either sitting on the couches or lying on the floor, all of them wrapped up in the thickest blankets they could find in the decaying linen closets. And astoundingly enough, despite the terror of the day- or perhaps because of it-, most of them were fast asleep. They hadn't gone to bed on an empty stomach, either: judging by the half-eaten carcasses on the table, the marksmen among them had clearly managed to catch several decent-sized birds. Also among the improvised feast were packets of biscuits (scavenged from the pantry), a large pile of freshly-cooked rats (also from the pantry), some fresh fruit (no doubt picked from the new forest outside) and far too many bottles of wine.

There were only a few people left awake, and none of them bothered to look up as Elphaba stepped into the room. Rasp, Woolwax, Curter the Artilleryman, and the rescued Gazelle all looked bleak and despondent- though the Gazelle certainly looked grateful to have avoided becoming part of the feast. Meanwhile, Elphaba, who was hungry after her long sleep, found one of the few clean plates available, helped herself to the scraps of the feast, poured herself a glass of wine, and sat down next to Rasp to eat.

"Sleep well?" he muttered.

"Decent enough, I suppose. Have you been helping yourself to the old wine racks?"

Rasp nodded sadly. "There's so many things that were left behind here," he said quietly, in that thoughtful tone unique to the mildly drunk. "So many _useful_ things. And they were all left behind, you see. All left behind. Just because people thought this place was cursed. What's the point of that?"

"Don't mind him," said Woolwax, the belligerence gone from his voice. "He's pissed."

Elphaba eyed the empty bottles around him. "And you aren't?" she asked sceptically, as she idly gnawed at a wing of roast pigeon.

"No. I'm completely sloshed as well. All the better for dealing with a drunken secretary and a Wicked Witch, tha's what I say. Now, where's Gnoll?"

"He's asleep."

"Good for him. We'll all be too hung-over to even see straight tomorrow morning, and we'll need a watchman. Then again, it's not as if we can actually go anywhere tomorrow, not with all that damn forest in the way. Buggered thing's so thick we couldn't figure out where we were going if we ever set out, and in some places, you can't even walk through it."

"You didn't think of much in that brainstorming session, did you? I mean, haven't any of you got axes- or anything that could cut down a tree with?"

Woolwax's inebriated smirk turned very ugly. "Don't suppose you'd know how long it'd take to cut down a tree as big as the ones growin' on our doorstep? We'd be cutting down trees for months before we could get anywhere! Not that I'd expect anythin' less from you- born with the magic silver spoon in your mouth and livin' in an ivory tower like this with all the damn thumbscrews locked away in a basement that supposedly doesn't exist-"

"Oh, don't start," groaned Rasp. "The last thing I want right now is a lecture on classism _and_ another paranoid rant about thumbscrews. Have another drink and go to sleep, would you?"

"Besides," he said to Elphaba, as the overbuilt Munchkin drew yet another bottle of wine from the table, "The brainstorming session was very productive; we've established that we couldn't get anywhere in a hurry, and that none of us are interested in using the explosives to try and clear a path. All in all, the uprising is dead in the water."

"That's it?" said Elphaba incredulously. "_That's_ all you could think of? In case you haven't noticed, it's not just _your_ lives that are at risk here! This is about all of Oz; this is about everyone who survived the Nome invasion! I mean, I don't know how you'd make any start on putting the country back together again, but are you just going to give up on them, let the Nomes steamroller us into submission? Do you want the Munchkins to remember you as the Governor Who Gave Up? Great Oz, Rasp, if you thought my sister was an unpopular Governor, then you haven't even considered how contemptible this will seem to future historians_._"

"In case you hadn't noticed, _Miss Thropp,_" Rasp grumbled, a noticeable slur in his voice, "We are facing almost insurmountable odds; we have had people standing on the roof with binoculars, and they tell me that the forest goes on for miles and miles and miles. Now, with that and whatever else the Nomes have up their sleeve, coupled with the fact that the destruction of just _one_ of them depends on careful placement of our very limited supply of explosives, it doesn't paint a very hopeful picture of the future. As I say, almost insurmountable odds. Insurmountable," he repeated unnecessarily.

Elphaba thought for a moment, and took a sip from her glass of wine, which tasted rather like being stabbed in the eyes with a red-hot poker. Once she'd shaken off the synaesthesia, a very obvious question suddenly occurred to her. "_Almost_ insurmountable?" she echoed.

"Well, you told me you've got spells that can smash Nomes to smithereens. And maybe we'll be able to put your magic to another use, as well..." He hesitated.

"Like what? Parting the trees? Burning the forests? Opening doorways between worlds? Turning the clouds into marzipan? What?"

"Well, it all depends on how much this lot's prepared to put up with you. And me," he added quietly. "And the whole... situation."

"What situation?"

"You know why the drinking started? It's because, about an hour and a half after you'd gone to bed, they finally realised just how many people have died. From first invasion to the growth of the forest, millions have been killed; just about everyone in this room has lost friends and family. They'll have lost parents, brothers, sisters, husbands and wives... and children." He sighed deeply.

"Have you lost anyone?" said Elphaba carefully, as she refilled her glass.

"Me? No." Rasp smiled broadly. "I was a civil servant before I became Acting Governor; bureaucrats like me don't have friends or families- we're not even classified as real people." He laughed self-deprecatingly, and maybe it was the wine eroding his professionalism, but Elphaba swore she could hear the mirthless, hollow quality to the laughter; true to form, the smile on his face didn't reach his eyes. "Have you lost anyone recently?" Rasp asked.

Elphaba wondered briefly if it would be better if she just threw caution to the wind and told him everything; besides, it was doubtful that the acting governor would believe it if she were to say that she was friends with Glinda, or that she was in love with the Scarecrow. But then again, from what Rasp had just told her, the refugees were on the brink of mental collapse; hearing the truth about their beloved leaders could only make things worse. In fact, if she were so inclined to share it with them, the truth behind the Wizard might just break them...

...and a part of her mind that should never have been exposed to alcohol muttered, _Tell them everything. Wake up the others and tell them the truth. Give them all the evidence you never had the chance to present without the Press making you look like an idiot. And make sure it drives their pitiful little minds to insanity._

Elphaba shuddered, and hastily suppressed the urge to act on these thoughts. Eventually, she offered a wry grin, and said, "Nope. Witches don't have friends or family either."

A melancholic frown spread across Rasp's face; perhaps Elphaba's glib tone had been just as transparent as his, or perhaps there'd been records mentioning the deaths in her family- assuming he hadn't noticed her frustration over Nessa's death. Then, the Acting Governor raised his refilled glass in an awkward salute. "To absent friends and family," he intoned solemnly.

Elphaba raised her own glass, returning the toast. "To absent friends and family," she agreed.

They each finished off their glasses in a single gulp; then, eyes watering, Rasp staggered over to the table to fetch another bottle of wine. As he fumbled with the cork, he muttered, "I suppose you can only look on the bright side. I mean, if we actually do save Oz with your help, you might just end up as a hero to the whole country."

"If I wanted to look like a hero to the people of Oz, then I would have taken the Wizard's employment offer from the moment it was voiced, and if I'd ever had any doubts about it, I wouldn't have backed out of it the second time."

There was silence for a moment, broken only by the snores of the refugees, and the sound of Woolwax finishing off his bottle of wine and letting out a belch like a mangled foghorn. Then Curter, who was getting more and more interested by the minute, leaned forward and murmured, "The Wizard offered you a job... and you turned it down?"

"That's right."

"But why?"

Elphaba rolled her eyes. "Haven't you heard?" she asked snidely. "I'm the Wicked Witch of the West- too wicked to even think of accepting promotion from the Great Oz."

"What kind of excuse is that?" snapped the artilleryman.

"The kind that satisfies most Ozians, as I recall."

Curter shot Elphaba a look of purest indignation. "It's just going to start all over again with you, isn't it?" he hissed furiously. "The denouncements of the Wizard, the attacks, the murders; now that you've returned to life, you're going to do it all over again!

Elphaba laughed. "You've been waiting for ages to say this, haven't you?" She sniffed the Munchkin's breath tentatively. "How much have you had to drink?"

"I've had exactly two glasses," the artilleryman lied; she'd seen him just about empty at least four glasses in the last half an hour. "…and don't change the subject!" he continued. "Haven't you ever thought of making up for what you've done in the past? Returning from the dead didn't stir any urge to actually live an honest life? Haven't you ever given any thought to redemption?"

"In my experience, redemption's usually only offered by smug opportunists with even worse atrocities to their names. Like your precious Wizard, for example," she added slyly.

"Oh bloody hell," muttered Rasp, who was obviously too drunk to keep up with the usual flow of pro-Wizard/Anti-Wicked Witch sentiment. He stood, and stretched awkwardly. "Does anyone mind if I borrow Miss Thropp for a minute?" he asked nobody in particular. "I'm not defending her or anything; I just have this aversion to drunken brawls to the death."

As Elphaba followed the Acting Governor away, she reflected somewhat absently on the fact that, had she woken up a few hours before, nobody in the room would have permitted a private conversation without an armed escort. _Thank heaven for the old wine racks_, she thought.

Stopping at the foot of the stairs, all attempts at talking were wrecked by their teeth chattering, until Rasp hurried off to fetch some blankets and another bottle of wine. Eventually, Elphaba managed to force out the words, "What did you want to talk to me about, exactly? Hurry, before we both die of hypothermia."

Rasp sighed. "Apart from getting you out of the room before Curter started talk, I didn't have much on my mind. Of course, there's always the issue of you helping us get into Nome territory and back, which nobody's going to like if and when I bring it up."

"So? Nobody's been very happy about me tagging along with you since I first landed… although," Elphaba admitted, "I was expecting more attempts on my life when I first joined you."

"Well, there were a few people who wanted to knife you to death while you were asleep, but they were put off by that rumour about you sleeping with your extra eye open. To be honest, I'm a bit surprised at the way things have turned out, too."

"How so?"

"You're more… er, personable than I expected."

Elphaba snorted. "Go on."

"You're also… well, I've already told you that you seemed practical enough not to make any attempts at killing us when you had a crossbow pointed at your spine. Question is, were you telling the truth when you said you needed our help?"

"Can you see me trying to take on an entire army of rock monsters alone?"

"I don't think any of us would make much of difference, especially since we're supposed to be fighting them on their home territory. I mean, assuming we can actually find a way of forcing them out of Oz."

"And releasing any hostages they have captive," said Elphaba quietly.

Rasp nodded. "And like I've said, we've still got to worry about _getting there_… which is where I start to question my sanity: I'm about to suggest a very stupid idea that I only came up with on my fifth glass of wine, and it's almost certainly going to get me lynched by the other refugees, but it's the only thing I imagine will get us anywhere near Nome territory before the end of the next century." He sighed, reached into the heap of military-grade explosives that sat beside the stairs, and drew out a very serviceable-looking broom.

Elphaba stared at it. "You want me to _fly_ you to the Nome dominions?" she whispered incredulously.

"Why not? You were flying there when Curter shot you down, weren't you?"

"This is different: assuming you've got at least eighteen brooms on hand for me to enchant-"

"I found about twenty-two," said Rasp helpfully. "I mean, we won't be taking absolutely everyone with us, will we? We certainly can't guarantee the safety of the children of the group, and something tells me that Gazelle won't be much good on a broomstick."

"Well, there's no telling anyone else will be any good on a broomstick, either: before I go ahead with the enchantments, I'll need guarantees that people won't fall off or lose their supplies or whatever. Flying by broom isn't as easy as it looks, you know."

"Alright then, what do you suggest? We've got plenty of materials to work with if you want to improvise something. Oz only knows there's no shortage of bloody carpets."

There was a long pause, as the word "carpets" hovered invitingly between the two of them.

"Could we actually do that?" Rasp whispered.

"I don't see why not; the levitation spell's hardly restricted to broomsticks. With some of the carpets we've got around here, we could certainly carry a lot more supplies… yes, the more I think about it, the more I like the idea."

"Brilliant! When can you start?"

"Ideally tomorrow, when the hangover's lifted and people are capable of moving again."

Rasp frowned. "Oh yes, and we've also got to start sorting the explosives into what we can and can't use against the Nomes; we might have to wait quite a while for people to be able to handle this stuff safely. Still," he added, brightly, "At least we know what we're doing now. I suppose things can only improve from here on…"


	16. Nightmares: Literal Or Otherwise

a/N: And here we go for our next chapter- political intruigue, brewing mysteries, and the Nome King's unique brand of persuasion. I hope you don't find it too overdone, ladies and gents; so, without further ado, by all means, read, review and enjoy!

Disclaimer: Wicked is not owned by me. If it did, it would have probably rebelled by now due to blatant mistreatment.

* * *

Sitting alone in his cell, his back to the rough crags of the wall, with patches of frost gathering on his burlap, Fiyero was very glad that he longer had any sense of touch.

On the other hand, he didn't envy the mysterious "Pinhead" in the next cell; assuming this person was a human being, he'd probably be on the verge of freezing to death at the moment. Unfortunately, the walls between the cells were far too thick to shout through, and Fiyero's attempts at trying to get his neighbour's attention by banging on the wall with his fist didn't have much of an effect either. So, with little else to do but sit and stare into the shadows, Fiyero amused himself by wondering (yet again) who this Pinhead was and what he'd done to end up imprisoned; unfortunately, once he'd sorted through the more fantastical explanations, he started to wonder if his neighbour was actually dead. It seemed worryingly possible: perhaps these weren't just jail cells but…

There was a word to describe the situation he and Pinhead had likely ended up in; Elphaba had told him about it months ago, on one of the quieter evenings when they'd had nothing to do but sit and talk. What had that word been again?

Ah yes: _immurement. _A way of disposing of troublesome prisoners without having the sharpen the axe or measure the noose; all you needed to do was brick the victim up in the spare room and leave him to rot- not too far from what had happened to Fiyero. After all, the Nome King had made it clear that Fiyero's only real purpose here was to act as bait for Elphaba. With that and his own immortality in mind, it wasn't as if anyone in the palace was obliged to give a damn, was it? And as for Pinhead, if he was human and he'd been here longer than Fiyero, then…

Fiyero shuddered in disgust, and hastily shook the idea out of his head; perhaps it would be best if he didn't think about Pinhead anymore.

From then on, he let himself drift: with no way of measuring time and almost nothing to occupy his attention, his stay in the darkness seemed to stretch on for months and months on end. He knew that it probably wasn't much longer than a few short hours, but it was a very vague kind of knowledge that had to work its way through the many layers of daydreams that had sprung up in the meantime. With nothing else to do, he entertained himself by imagining Elphaba's path across the forest that Oz had become, the journey she was taking to reach the Nome King's Mountain. When he ran out of ideas, he started reminiscing on the days when he and Elphaba had been together. When he'd exhausted all three hundred and sixty days of that hard but joyous life outside Oz, he moved further backwards through his memories. And though at times his memory of his early days as the Scarecrow grew too hazy to visualize…

… if he closed his eyes and thought hard enough, he could just about recall that painful day when, blood-streaked and broken-limbed from the tender ministrations of his former unit, the wave of magic had swept over him, transmuting torn skin to burlap and ruined flesh to straw… saving him in the only way Elphaba could manage at the time. Under the influence of torture, his mind had drifted then, too…

There was a rumble from the wall in front of him, and he looked up in time to see the figure of a Nome emerging from the rock. For a moment, he thought that the King had arrived for another unwanted conversation; then he noticed the featureless cast of the face. This was clearly another one of the servants.

"I apologise for the intrusion, Your Highness," it intoned, "But I was wondering if you could assist me with my inquiries."

"Is that so?" Fiyero asked. "I suppose the King's too busy to question me, then."

"I was not assigned this duty by the King; I am conducting this inquest as a sideline investigation into the health of one of the King's personal guests."

"And exactly who are you, then?"

The Nome bowed. "I have been given the name Basalt. I have been made Bodyguard and Protector to Miss Glinda Upland- the guest I previously mentioned."

Fiyero's heart turned to ice. For a moment, he pondered the fact that Glinda was a personal guest and not prisoner; then the fact that Basalt had been making inquiries about Glinda's health finally hit home. "She's not hurt, is she?" he asked hurriedly, lurching clumsily to his feet. "She's not in any danger?"

"She is under no threat of assassination at the moment, and physically, she is in perfect health. Mentally, however…" Basalt hesitated. "I believe she may be at risk. She has become obsessed with the work the King has given her-"

"Wait a minute, _work?_ She's working for the Nome King? _Why?"_

"I confess that I do not know all the details- it is not my place to know. However, I know that she was promised a means of going back in time and-"

"_What?"_

"-saving an individual named Elphaba, known in the Land of Oz as the Wicked Witch of the West."

Fiyero's jaw dropped open. Ever since their escape from Oz over a year past, both he and Elphaba had agonised over the fact that they'd left Glinda thinking that the two of them were dead; they'd known how much it must have hurt her, and Fiyero himself had seen her grief face-to-face just a few days ago. But the idea that Glinda was so desperate to undo what had happened that she'd made a deal with the Nome King- that she might actually be on the verge of insanity, assuming that was what Basalt was implying- was almost too much to process.

He slumped against the wall, his straw legs somehow feeling even more boneless than usual. "What is she doing for him at the moment?" he asked weakly.

"I do not know; I am merely to ensure Miss Glinda's wellbeing."

"Then what do you want me to do, exactly?"

"Only to provide a few details; I have made inquiries elsewhere, and Miss Glinda has told me of Elphaba's notoriety in Oz and the death than resulted because of it. However, in my attempts to ensure the sanity of the King's guest, I have discovered something rather strange in Glinda's memories: she affirms the fact that Elphaba died from exposure to water, a substance she was allergic to. However, she also mentions the fact Elphaba was never seen crying, nor did she ever suffer any injuries as a result of crying. As you were among those responsible for her death, were you ever close enough to her to observe any facial scarring?"

Fiyero took a deep breath and tried to collect himself a bit before responding. The most he could say was, "You don't beat around the bush, do you?"

Basalt looked nonplussed.

"I mean, you're very direct; you haven't given me much of a chance to think about all of this, if you know what I mean?"

"I apologise for my offence," said the Nome. "I merely wish to know if Glinda's memory is incorrect, and if so, whether or not this is indicative of a mental breakdown."

Fiyero opened his mouth to produce the same cover story he'd used whenever somebody asked him about the "Wicked Witch's" final moments, when a thought struck him. "Don't you know already? The Nome King told me that he'd been spying on me and the rest of Oz for years- shouldn't you know too?"

"I was promoted from the ranks of domestic servants, not the spies; only they would be privy to such information, and those of them who were assigned to observe Oz before the invasion refuse to tell me anything."

"Your charm and sparkling wit had no effect on them, I take it?"

"The spies are the least privileged of us," Basalt explained, completely immune to the sarcasm. "They cannot be persuaded, for they have no emotions to appeal to and no imagination to promise to; they are what you might call "soulless." They can only be dealt with by authority, and it would appear that the King wishes to keep what they have learned a secret. So, I have come to you for help."

"Can't you just ask the King?"

For the second time in as many minutes, Basalt's otherwise blank face managed a look of confusion.

"Okay, stupid question," Fiyero admitted sheepishly. "I just thought Roquat might be willing to share that information with his underlings."

There was a brief pause, and then Basalt's stone skin _bristled, _the granite abruptly reforming itself into a mess of nonspecific shapes before hurriedly flatting itself back into his body (Fiyero later learned that this was the Nome equivalent of a double-take). "Roquat?" he asked flatly.

"Roquat the Red- the Nome King," Fiyero clarified. "He told me his name a few hours ago."

"… You are certain?"

"Very certain: he introduced himself as that, anyway. Why, is there something wrong?"

For fifteen seconds, Basalt said nothing; perhaps he was having trouble believing what he'd just been told, or maybe he just thought very slowly at the best of times. "King Roquat has been dead for almost fourteen years," he said at last. "Our current monarch is his successor."

"That's not much of a handicap these days," Fiyero remarked, completely deadpan. "I've been dead for over a year and it hasn't gotten in the way of my success, as you see."

"I beg your pardon?"

"Never mind." He knew he probably should have been a bit more tight-lipped about what he said to this particular Nome considering just how nosy he was being about Fiyero's better-kept secrets, but to be brutally honest, the situation was so far beyond repair that any mistake he made could hardly worsen it. He shrugged: "I suppose I could have heard wrong," he admitted.

Basalt shook his monolithic head. "The name is too specific for it to have been a mistake; but why would the current King take on the name of his dead predecessor? Why would he even tell you his name when he has not…" He paused, and Fiyero suddenly had the feeling that the bodyguard had _almost_ said too much. "I should not inconvenience you any further than I should," he said. "I need only to know if you were able to see any scarring on-"

There was a rumble from behind him, and the face of another Nome servant materialised on the wall behind him; it whispered quickly into Basalt's ear for a moment, and then vanished.

"I must go," said Basalt, his tone suddenly very rushed. "Perhaps we can continue this discussion another time; thank you for your cooperation…"

As he tunnelled back into the wall, Fiyero wondered what could have gotten the otherwise emotionless Nome so worked up; then he remembered the fact that a) Basalt was, as per his job description, concerned with Glinda's well-being, and b) he'd said that she wasn't in danger of assassination at the moment- ie: not _yet._

_Damn it,_ he thought, slumping wearily to the floor. _When will it end?_

_And how?_

* * *

One of the few spies that Basalt had the authority to command had just delivered a very important piece of news: against all expectations, one of the Generals had arrived in the Nome Dominions ahead of schedule, and was now burrowing through the mountain towards the palace. So, remembering the King's warning that the War Council would have Glinda killed if they ever learned of her purpose, Basalt took a brief detour to the guest quarters to check for intruders; finding Glinda fast asleep and clearly unhurt, he hurried to the entrance hall to witness the new arrival.

As expected, the entrance hall was crowded with Nome servants and guards, arrayed in neat ranks against the walls, separated only by the massive columns that dominated the chamber; in the centre of the room stood the Chamberlain, who was managing the palace in the King's temporary absence and as such, obliged to greet an emissary of the War council in person. Meanwhile, thanks to his recent promotion, Basalt was assigned a place with a unit of palace guards to the immediate left of the Chamberlain; he didn't feel that this was at all appropriate, for the palace guards were far more privileged than he was, having long since earned anger, pride, bloodlust, and even the right to alter their bodies according to personal preference. Standing next to them, with their ruby carapaces and expressive faces, he felt very out of place. There was nothing for it though: protectors were part of the guard, and there was no time to debate it.

From the patch of towering bedrock that marked the entrance to the palace itself, there was a thunderous rumbling as the General arrived in the hall, his fifteen-foot-tall body setting foot on the stone floor with an equally loud thud. As generals were among the most privileged and magically skilled of all Nomes, they generally crafted their bodies with much extravagance, and this one was no exception: having contained the substance of his favoured shape in a field of pure magic, he now stood before the assembled crowd in a streamlined white marble body with long, tapering limbs and a conical torso decorated with what could only be handcrafted veins of gold.

As he stepped closer, Basalt realised that this predilection for the metal hadn't stopped at his body; his shoulders were also decorated with long quills of the same material, and his eyes had been replaced with two orbs of solid gold- in which Basalt recognized the emotions of "confusion" and "annoyance."

The Chamberlain bowed low, his own platinum decorations gleaming in the ambient magical light. "Greetings, Most Honoured Lord Scathelex; on behalf of His Majesty, allow me to welcome you to the Palace of Nomekind."

Scathelex inclined his head in some semblance of a bow. "Greetings, Chamberlain. However, I am well aware of where I am; this palace has become somewhat notorious among the council. So, where is his Majesty at present? The library? The foundations? Or is he cataloguing his… ornament collection?"

"I am afraid his Majesty is currently engaged in business outside the palace."

"And why would that be? Surely our dealings in Oz have concluded for the moment?"

"I am not at liberty to say, My Lord."

"And what of this talk I have heard of prisoners being moved under the King's own authority? I thought he still at least deferred to our judgement? And more to the point- why was the Council not informed of the secondary attack on Oz? As their representative, I cannot stress the inconvenience it poses to future developments!"

"Again, I am regrettably not at liberty to say, My Lord; I can only recommend you voice these concerns to the King when his business is concluded."

Scathelex's lips pursed; "I presume you are in charge for the duration of the King's… business?"

"Yes, My Lord."

"Then can you at least provide me with refreshment while I wait? The withdrawing rooms should be finished by now, if I am not mistaken."

As the Chamberlain ushered Scathelex hurriedly away and the gathering slowly began to disperse, Basalt noticed the wall behind him ripple; it was a miniscule Nome, probably little more than a spy, skimming the surface of the wall as it followed the General down the corridor. By that time, the Chamberlain had moved slightly ahead, allowing the two Nomes to exchange a few words in privacy- or what they thought was privacy.

The moment the spy left, Basalt followed it into the walls and tailed it as closely as he could without drawing attention to himself; however, it had been told how avoid being followed, for it took such a longwinded path that Basalt almost lost it more than once. Eventually, the two of them emerged in the corridor outside the guest rooms- somewhat unsurprisingly, just outside Glinda's room.

As the spy began inspecting the sealed door, Basalt cleared his throat, and rumbled, "State your business."

The spy blinked at him- an impressive feat, considering that most spies were all eyeball. "I represent Lord Scathelex," it said, and went back to inspecting the door.

"You have not stated your business," Basalt reminded it.

"I represent Lord Scathelex. He wants to know about the King's prisoners."

"Then you may inspect the dungeons; you will find no prisoners here, only guests, and the King has ordered that they are not to be disturbed or observed."

The spy blinked again, and disappeared into the opposite wall, tunnelling away from the guest quarters; obviously, it hadn't been expecting a bodyguard, so it had probably gone back to Lord Scathelex to gain his personal permission to inspect the rooms.

Just as Basalt was wondering what he would have to do to thwart the spy when he returned, Glinda's voice broke the silence with a deafening scream of horror.

* * *

Glinda wished she could have looked Elphaba in the eye while saying this; she honestly wished she could say what she had to say next without shame, but she knew well enough that she'd never manage it, no matter how many times she told herself that Elphaba was dead and that this was all a dream. So, her eyes to the floor and her throat seized up, she mumbled, "I don't think I can do this, Elphaba; this spell, I… I just don't know if I can bring myself to carry on with it."

She heard her friend sigh, and she hurried on: "I mean, I think I'll be able to finish translating it in a week or so if I've been accurate enough so far, and I should be able to cast it without too much trouble, but… knowing what the King hopes to use it for, I can't… even if it means never seeing you again except in dreams…"

There was an agonizing pause, broken only by the sound of Dorothy crying from the tiny holding cell bellow them, one of the few constants maintained in the dreamworld replica of Kiamo Ko. At long last, Elphaba said, gently, "I don't blame you for having doubts about this; it's true that the spell will allow the Nome King to destroy all that remains of Oz- and probably bring the rest of the world under his control, too. But that doesn't change the fact that everything we fought for was a lost cause long before he came along; the only way you have of changing things for the better is to continue working on the spell. And besides," she added, "Do you really want to spend the rest of your life waiting to fall asleep so you can see me again?"

"What do you mean?"

"I'm dead, not blind; I've noticed how you look forward to these little meetings. Every moment you're awake, you yearn to be asleep again just so you can dream of me. That's no way to live, Glinda, and besides, the dreams can't stay pleasant forever; sooner or later, they'll become nightmares. Sooner or later, they'll become just as miserable as the waking world is to you now."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Because I want you to know what will eventually happen should you refuse to continue working. I won't blame you if you do, but I'd rather if you made your decision with full view of the consequences-"

From somewhere in the distance, there was the crash of a battering ram colliding with a door, followed by a shout of triumph from a freshly-materialised mob of angry Ozians. "Oh no," Elphaba whispered. "It's starting."

"What?"

"A nightmare. I think you should probably get behind the curtain again, Glinda; I think it's going to be slightly different this time around, but no less painful for both of us-"

At the far end of the hall, there was another crash of splintering woods, and door collapsed inwards, revealing a small army of heavily-armed witch hunters. Bellowing, they swarmed across the room towards Elphaba, howling the familiar battlecry of "Wickedness Must Be Punished!" If they could even see that Glinda was standing in the way, they certainly didn't care; they charged onwards, literally walking right through her as the first four of them seized Elphaba roughly by the shoulders, dragging her to the ground.

Glinda backed away in horror, her mind blank save for the words _This wasn't how it happened, _repeated over and over again; she'd gotten about five feet away before she bumped straight into Madame Morrible, who was smiling with undisguised delight. "Well done, Glinda!" the Press Secretary cackled. "I hardly imagined that you'd be the one who'd bring us final victory over the Witch, but it would seem that you've outdone even the Wizard's expectations!"

"But… but I didn't-"

"Oh, don't be modest; you know full well that all of our major successes in the last few days have been in no small part due to your services; you gave us a way of forcing Elphaba to show herself, you helped exposiate a traitor in the ranks of the guards, and you even risked your life in distracting Elphaba from noticing our approach until it was too late!"

_No, no, no… please make it stop, please, someone wake me up; this wasn't how it happened, this wasn't how it happened, this wasn't how it happened, this wasn't how it happened…_

Elphaba was now on her knees, her arms and legs heavily manacled, and her face covered in fresh bruises; one of the witch-hunters was buckling an unpleasant-looking assembly of belts, clamps and vices to her head. Glinda couldn't be sure what they were hoping to do, but it looked as though the device was meant to force the eyes and mouth open.

Then she saw the bucket of water being passed through the crowd, and her heart very nearly stopped.

She opened her mouth to protest, to beg them to leave Elphaba alone, to take her into custody instead of executing her, but her voice refused to sound. She couldn't move either; she could only stand there and watch as the chant of "KILL HER!" rose from the amassed witch-hunters, growing louder and more bloodthirsty with every second that passed. And then, just when she thought it couldn't get any worse, Morrible drew an eyedropper from her robe, and said, "Glinda, dear, would you do the honours?"

And the same force that had paralysed her limbs and muted her voice turned her in Morrible's direction to accept the eyedropper; as her mind howled in disbelief and horror, her body marched like a sleepwalker towards the bucket of water, filled the eyedropper, and slowly turned to face Elphaba. The restrained witch returned her gaze calmly, almost reassuringly, as if she knew that Glinda couldn't stop herself from doing what she was about to do.

Glinda, meanwhile, was still screaming helplessly inside her own skull, looking out at her own body mindlessly following the course of the nightmare; she saw her hand raising the eyedropper over Elphaba's face, and in that instant she would have given anything to be able to look away, to close her eyes, to wake up- anything that would take her away from this place. But no: she could only watch as the dropper stopped just above Elphaba's left eye.

For what felt like centuries, a miniscule droplet of water dangled from its end.

Then, it fell.

Elphaba _screamed._

Inside her mind, Glinda, who'd had an undisturbed view of what had just happened to the eye, screamed as well. _It's only a dream, _she gibbered helplessly, _it's only a dream, it's not real, I haven't just blinded my best friend in one eye and I'm not about to do the same for the other one and I won't take part in killing her, it's only a dream- Elphie please forgive me, someone stop me please, someone wake me up, somebody do something-_

But nothing could stop her from applying a second droplet of water to the right eye. And the worst was still to come; the bucket of water was now being raised, Morrible ready to pour down Elphaba's throat and dissolve her from the inside out.

* * *

"**No further lingering doubts, I hope,"** the Nome King muttered irritably, a few hundred thousand miles away. **"Now awake… and get back to work."**

* * *

Basalt lurched into the room, fully expecting to see Glinda under attack by an assassin; instead, he found her still in bed, her eyes shut, and all life signs currently indicating that she was still asleep- except for course for the fact that she was screaming.

Was this the start of madness? The effects of a poisoning? The symptoms of a disease? Might there be magic involved? Basalt cursed himself for not studying the book on human anatomy for longer, and surveyed his options as quickly as possible; in the event that Glinda was in any physical danger, it wasn't likely that he'd be able to help much without accidentally damaging her bone structure- doubly likely given how she was thrashing around. Of course, there was the possibility that there were individuals in the palace able to help; the higher-ranking soldiery might understand human physiology enough to help, but that would mean uncovering what the King had wanted to keep secret.

Then, just as he was about to risk trying to wake her up, the screaming abruptly ground to a halt; after a moment of silence, Glinda's eyes flickered open, and she very slowly sat up in bed.

Remembering the possibility that this strange fit might have been caused by poison or illness, Basalt hurriedly took in as many observable symptoms as possible. Among the most noticeable of them was the fact that Glinda was shivering, even though the room was comfortably warm by human standards. She also appeared to be sweating - further evidence of a worsening ailment, perhaps?

For a full minute, she sat there, her eyes downcast and her expression blank; then, she murmured quietly, "Why can't I even _dream_ of doing the right thing?"

"Miss Glinda?" Basalt whispered. "Are you alright?"

Glinda let out a sigh that could only be of exasperation. "No, Basalt; I'm as far from "alright" as I can get at this point. In the last year or so, I've tried to do what was right for the people of Oz. True, I was deposed for it, but you can't please everyone. But then, the Emerald City gets conquered by the Nomes; I accept your King's offer and compromise every single one of my principilations, and I can't even back out of the bargain without leaving the country even worse off than it was in the time of the Wizard! What is _wrong_ with me?"

Basalt did not know how to respond to this, so he remained silent.

Glinda somehow managed to sigh even deeper than before. "Basalt," she said wearily, "Do you trust the King to… to do what's right with the power I'm supposed to give him?"

"I trust him to do what is right for Nomekind," Basalt answered simply.

"You're not just saying that because he's promoted you, though, are you? You really do believe that?"

"Implicitly."

"What about doing what's right for _everyone?_ What about that?"

"The King's duties do not extend to non-Nomes; he is merely to govern _us_, to safeguard our civilisation and culture. Everything he does is for our own good."

Glinda made a face. "Word of advice, Basalt: never believe anyone when they say they're doing something "for your own good." Even if they are, it's safer to at least question them; I found that out the hard way."

Basalt, who knew enough about Oz to know of how it had been subjugated by the fraudulent "Wizard" for over twenty years, had to admit that Glinda had a point. However, the idea of it applying to the King didn't seem entirely plausible to Basalt- even with the mystery of his name to think of. So he carefully diverted the conversation: "Miss Glinda, I meant to ask; you were screaming in your sleep a minute ago-"

"I was just having a nightmare. That's all."

"A… nightmare?"

The conversation halted for almost five minutes, as Glinda went about explaining the concept of a nightmare, then dreaming, and stopping just short of explaining the process of sleep (which Basalt's studies into human physiology had thankfully included). Eventually, after some cajoling, Glinda also explained that the nightmare which had been the cause of her earlier distress had been about Elphaba, her dead friend that she'd bargained with the King to see again through time travel, combined with her anxieties over the bargain. "I know there's no other option that could actually save Oz, but that doesn't make me feel any better about it." She offered a smile of what could only be apology. "I know that some of this might be a bit confusifying to you, but I've hardly said anything in the last day or so, and I just need to get some things off my chest. You don't mind, do you?"

"Not at all, Miss Glinda; if it will help you retain your sanity, I will listen."

Glinda nodded, smiling once again- this time in "relief" and "satisfaction." Then, sobering again, she asked, "If you were given the chance of undoing one of the worst mistakes of your life, would you take it? If you could save _your_ best friend from death, would you pay the price to do so? Just a rhetoricalitific question."

_Rhetoricalitific?_

"I have never had friends in my lifespan thus far," Basalt admitted. "So I know nothing of friendships."

"Really? Is this something to do with the Privileges system?"

"Yes: as low-ranking Nomes lack emotions, we find it very difficult to form connections of any kind, and those of us who have risen high enough and attained enough privileges to do so cannot reveal the secrets of friendship, for they would mean little to the unprivileged."

"But if you _could_ make friends," said Glinda, wheedlingly, "If you _did_ have a best friend, wouldn't you do anything to save their life?"

Basalt wasn't certain how to answer this; with so few emotions of his own, there was no way for him to guess at what befriending another living being would be like. However, in the hours since he'd earned the latest of his privileges, he'd grown accustomed to them, learned to appreciate them and perhaps- on some distant level- even enjoy them. And he also had just enough imagination to know that a future without them would not be one worth living, and that he would fight to defend them in any way he could. Perhaps, he reasoned, were he fortunate and diligent enough to one day gain enough privileges to form friendships, he would feel the same way about his friends.

So at long last, he rumbled, "I imagine that I would."

Glinda smiled; and for some reason, Basalt found this curiously reassuring. "I'm probably just trying to justify what I've done, even though I didn't have any choice in the end," she said quietly. "But for what it's worth, I want to thank you for listening; it means a lot to me."

Basalt bowed his head respectfully.

However, when he rose again, he heard the sound of the rock wall behind him shifting, and he turned to see Lord Scathelex's miniscule spy finishing a hurried inspection of Glinda's desk. Before he could make a move against it, the spy had already retreated back into the wall; for a moment, he considered pursuing it, but eventually decided not to- after all, spy Nomes had a natural advantage in speed, and even if he did catch up, what could he possibly do to stop it from revealing what it had learned? Killing it certainly wouldn't do much good, not when its master was expecting a report.

So, he simply stood guard on the room as Glinda slowly returned to work; it was always interesting to observe magic being practiced, so for the next half an hour, Basalt was content to watch Glinda painstakingly translating the cyphers of the Grimmerie, taking careful notes of the meanings, and occasionally testing what she had learned on one of the test subjects the King had provided.

Eventually, Glinda looked up from her notes and asked, "What time is it, Basalt?"

"Approximately 6:43 AM, Ozian time, Miss Glinda."

"I think it's time for breakfast, then."

Basalt nodded, and left. He wasn't intending to stray too far from the guest quarters, not with the King out of the palace and the threat of assassination looming closer to Glinda by the hour, so he simply emerged into the corridor- just far enough to call for one of the servants.

Instead, he found himself face to face with Lord Scathelex.

"I assume I need no introduction," he said coldly. "You were present in the entrance hall when I arrived, yes?"

"Yes, My Lord. I have been given-"

Scathelex held up a hand. "I have no need of your assignment, servicer."

"As you wish, my lord; how may I assist you?"

Scathelex offered a singularly unnerving grin. "You can assist me by delivering a message to His Majesty the King when he returns- in the event that you have the opportunity to do so of course. Tell him that I know what your charge is studying; we of the War Council were generous in tolerating the previous monarch's senility, and we are _more_ than generous in tolerating the eccentricities of the current one- we even put up with all the perusals of mortal literature and music. But we will _not_ tolerate his attempts to become a human being, least of all through the efforts of an Ozian witch."

"I beg your pardon?"

"My operative was not able to comprehend the spellbook, but it knew enough of the language to understand the Witch's notes- and they were very clear on what he'd commissioned her to do. Now, in all likelihood, you won't be able to deliver this message; His Majesty will probably be gone for upwards of seven hours, and believe me, servicer, a _lot_ can happen in seven hours. On the other hand, you could always opt to work for me and the other generals; that way, you could forget about that message, and any unpleasantness that might befall the prisoner will bypass you altogether."

"I do not understand."

"Come now, servicer," Scathelex purred. "You must have some idea how little power the King has. Those tall tales you've no doubt heard about him- he was never in battle when the time came to take Oz. He led from the sidelines, pushing figurines around a map, pretending to strategize. He scarcely has the power to travel on his own, let alone reward you for your services in attending to this Witch; haven't you wondered when your name and privileges will be granted to you?"

"No," said Basalt. "I have a name, and the rank of protector- both personally granted to me by His Majesty."

Two solid-gold eyeballs stared at Basalt in consternation.

"Furthermore, despite my guard duties, I am not one of the military, nor am I a member of the law enforcement; I cannot work for you, My Lord, even if I wanted to. I am bound to serve the needs of the King and his guests, not the War Council."

"Very well then," Scathelex fumed, his spidery fingers clicking irritably together, the quills on his shoulders whirring with metallurgic sorcery. "If you insist on remaining loyal, then I will not insult you further. Just remember that you had the option of serving those who have ruled the Nome Dominions since before the death of the previous king. Oh," he added, as he turned to leave, "And should you ever have the chance to speak to his majesty, also tell him that we have noticed the… abominations dumped in Northern Munchkinland. If this has anything to do with him, then our retribution will be swift and unpleasant."

He stormed off, leaving Basalt with a lot to think about.

The revelation that the King had introduced himself to the Scarecrow with the name of his predecessor was unusual, to say the least, considering that the King had publically stated that he had given up his name as part of his ascendency to the crown. But now, the King was apparently attempting to transform himself into a _human_- the very details of the conversation held between him and Glinda that Basalt had only half-heard.

Why would the king want to become human?

What else had Basalt been foolish enough to avert his ears to?

And what were these "abominations" that Scathelex had mentioned?

Basalt shook his head; these questions could wait until he had the time to make his inquiries. He had his duties to attend to…

… and an assassination to thwart.

* * *

Next week: Elphaba takes flight once more!


	17. Ascending

A/N: At long last, the latest chapter! I hope the wait hasn't been too annoying, and I'd like to thank my reviewers for their generosity; I also have to agree with Anna Marie Raven- it _is_ a shame that_ Return to Oz _ended up so derided in its early days. It's picked up some popularity in the meatime, but it still seems a bit depressing.

In the meantime, important questions: do Basalt or any of my other Original Characters seem to be leaning towards Mary Sueism? Does the Nome King appear to be edging in the direction of a Villain Sue? I've tried to keep them balanced, but it always pays to check with my readers. But, without further ado, here's the chapter: assassinations, levitations, and my own disastrous attempts at filtering in some elements from the novel version of _Wicked!_ Read, review and enjoy!

Disclaimer: _Wicked_ does not belong to me. Nor does _Return To Oz_, or any other facet of the World of Oz, for that matter.

* * *

Early that morning, the refugees rose from their blankets and pillows like half-hearted ghosts, all of them groaning, whimpering, clutching their heads as if they were afraid that their skulls might sprout wings and fly away. Hangovers were in full swing all over the house; for almost an hour, the afflicted sat upright in the makeshift beds, trying to make the room hold still, not daring to move in case the pain worsened. Any attempts at getting up or making noise of any kind were met with an immediate chorus of "Shut uuuuuuup" from the others.

There were a few people who weren't in this condition, though: Gnoll had slept through the boozing, and as such, clumped noisily down the stairs at eight o'clock with a buoyant smile on his face, whereupon half a dozen refugees told him to go and shove a goose where the sun didn't shine. Elphaba and Rasp were also up and about; Elphaba had insisted that they track down a source of drinkable water the previous evening, and with Rasp's knowledge of the floor plan, they found the old well- and enough water to stop their hangovers from becoming crippling. And of course, there were the four refugee children, who'd been forbidden to even approach the wine racks- on the grounds of being young enough to spend the journey across the ruins of Munchkinland hiding under the coats of their respective parents and dodging Elphaba's initial tally of the refugees.

Unfortunately, this meant that they were loose in the house, either laughing at Rasp's "toilet-brush" hair or fleeing in terror from Elphaba. Thankfully, after half an hour of cajoling and threatening, they finally managed to get them organised enough to help them haul their makeshift transports down the stairs and unfurl it on the ground floor landing. By then the refugees were shambling out of the lounge, allowing Rasp to present their best hope for taking the fight to the Nomes.

After several uncomfortable coughs and the occasional groan of pain, one of the refugees managed to say the only thing that could be said under the circumstances: "_Carpets?_"

"_Flying_ carpets," said Elphaba smugly.

There was a strangled moan from the Gilikin businessman, who was leaning against the wall, his skin pale and clammy from the previous evening's binge, his clothes badly stained and discoloured by it . "As if we're not in enough danger already," he said shakily, "You're going to ask _her_ to make these things fly- just so she can tip us all off at high altitude when she loses interest in us?"

"I'm not _going_ to ask her," said Rasp. "I already have. And she's accepted."

"Listen, you chinless wonder-"

"_Acting Governor,_ if you please."

The businessman rolled his eyes, and grumbled, "Acting Governor, this is insane. Everybody here knows you can't trust her- Great Bloody Oz, everybody in this country knows you can't trust her."

"Well, that's true enough, but I'm afraid we've run out of options. It's either this or we spend the next few decades trying to chop and saw our way through the thicker sections of the forests… unless of course, you've got any better ideas?"

The businessman scowled furiously, but said nothing. Rasp smiled pleasantly back at him, before announcing, "We still have to prepare for the journey; we've got to pack supplies, we've got to ready the explosives so we can use them quickly if need be, and we've got to decide who actually goes with us." There was a discontented grumbling from the crowd, and Rasp added hastily, "Well, we don't want to endanger the children, do we?"

The grumbling slowly became a ripple of yesses and other affirmatives.

"Right then. Now, since I don't want anyone blowing themselves up, I think it'd be best if we wait until the hangovers die down a little before we get to work; in the meantime, we'll sort out who'll be going with us and who'll be staying here to keep the children safe."

"And while you're at it," said Elphaba, "I'm going to need a volunteer to help me make sure this thing functions properly." She smiled broadly at the crowd. "Any takers?"

There was immediate silence, except of course for the sound of fifteen adults and four children simultaneously backing away. Hurriedly, they glanced around themselves, looking for a patsy; their mutual gaze eventually landed on- in order of appearance- Gnoll, the Gazelle, Woolwax and Rasp. All of them looked sceptically back at the crowd, and shook their heads.

"I can't be an assistant," Gnoll grunted. "I'm still guarding her."

The Gazelle rolled his eyes. "If the assistant duties involve any serious dexterity, then I'm afraid I'll be of no help to you." He nodded meaningfully at his hooves.

"I'm still hungover," mumbled Woolwax, who certainly looked the part.

"Oh for Oz's sake," sighed Rasp. "Mr Brollan, congratulations; you're Miss Thropp's new assistant!"

It was the first time that Elphaba had ever heard the Gilikin businessman's name used in conversation- at all, in fact. Unsurprisingly, though, the newly-unveiled Mr Brollan was looking shocked and stunned at the governor's decision. "Why me?" he asked flatly.

Rasp shrugged. "You wanted to know if Miss Thropp could be trusted or not; you'll get to find out, this way. Now, if you'll excuse us, we've got work to do." He turned, and led the huddle of refugees streaming back through the corridor towards the lounge; all that remained were Elphaba, Gnoll, and a very surly-looking Brollan.

For the next five minutes, he leant against the wall and sulked as Elphaba rummaged through her bag for the collection of notes she'd used to record some of the more useful spells of the Grimmerie. Gnoll, meanwhile, pointed his crossbow vaguely in her direction and helped himself to a plate of biscuits leftover from the previous evening's meal as Elphaba began chanting the words of the levitation spell.

She was just beginning to feel the first stirring of serious nostalgia for the time when she'd enchanted her first broom, when Brollan interrupted her reverie with a snarl of "What are you playing at?"

Elphaba stopped chanting, and glared at the businessman. "I'm _trying_ to levitate a seven-by-four-foot length of knotted wool," she said irritably. "Does that answer your question?"

"No. I want to know what you're planning."

"Not a lot, unfortunately; the best plan Rasp and I have been able to work out is to fly into Nome territory and wage a guerrilla war destructive enough to get the attention of their leadership. If we can keep it up long enough without getting caught or killed, or landing either one of the carpets for that matter, we might be able to eventually force them to capitulate… but it's still a long shot."

"Rasp and I?" echoed Brollan.

"Mutual brainstorming; I was obliged to provide most of the realism."

"And we're supposed to trust you not to betray us? We're not going to wake up one morning to find ourselves surrounded by Nomes and you soaring off into the horizon?"

Elphaba laughed. "Is this before or after I'm supposed to have bombarded them with magic? Something tells me that they wouldn't be interested in listening to anything I'd have to say after that. Of course," she added, her smile fading, "they might not be interested in anything I have to say anyway; the Nomes don't strike me as the kind of invaders likely to take prisoners." _Except Glinda and Fiyero,_ she thought sadly.

Brollan's sarcasm was not to be dampened, however: "So there's a good chance they won't even stop to demand prisoners before killing us? Perfect! Just what I always wanted: to spend the last few minutes of my life clinging to an oversized bathroom rug, right before some Nome reaches up and makes me the filling of a carpet sandwich! I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to this!"

"Would you mind shutting up? I've got spells to cast, in case you hadn't noticed."

Unfortunately, the Gilikin kept on talking: he'd been in a foul mood ever since they'd allowed the Gazelle into the house, and the hangover had not improved it. And now that his fellow businessman had tired of being the only sympathetic ear in the building, his rage had been left to build to cataclysmic levels. So, for the next minute, he screamed his misgivings about almost anything he could think of, from the fact that Governor Rasp was _obviously_ a madman and a traitor who'd been in cahoots with the Wicked Witches ever since they'd appeared in Oz, to the fact that there was an Animal in the building who had no doubt been sent by the Nomes to undermine their efforts, and so on and so forth. He pointed fingers, he gnashed his teeth, he jumped furiously up and down on the spot, he kicked the wall and immediately clutched his foot in pain, he used language that would have made Woolwax blush; he performed every single cliché appropriate to a temper tantrum, stopping just short of physically attacking someone. Surprisingly, though, Elphaba found Brollan's ranting so predictable and repetitive that she was able to almost completely disconnect herself from it as she went about chanting the words of the spell; of course, it helped that none of the abuse was actually directed at her. In fact, a good deal of the shouting was addressed to the ceiling, and occasionally to Gnoll's left boot.

_I suppose that means I can at least stop thinking of him as Mombi with the serial numbers filed off,_ Elphaba thought snidely.

A minute later, Brollan finished his monologue with a paranoid rant about how the invasion had clearly been planned by his business rivals to destroy his offices and factories, and the resurrection of the Witch had been planned ahead of time to destroy his own standing among Emerald City's selfish, hidebound old-boys club of industrialists. Then, he fell silent, red-faced and panting, his rage finally spent, and Elphaba took this as an opportunity to say, "I've finished; care to have a seat?"

The businessman looked sceptically at the carpet, which was now hovering just a couple of feet off the ground. "I honestly don't understand you," he grumbled.

"I wasn't aware that understanding me was necessary. Now get on the damn carpet."

He let out a furious sigh, but began crossing the room all the same; though he was a little hesitant to even touch the carpet at first, with some gentle prodding from Gnoll and Elphaba, he eventually sat down. As Elphaba checked the carpet for any signs of warping or collapse, Brollan chose that moment to repeat himself: "I don't understand you. I'm serious; everything you've done since you joined us has baffled me. I mean, why are you doing _any_ of this?"

"Any of what?"

"This! Helping us!"

Elphaba rolled her eyes, as she began examining the fabric of the carpet with a jeweller's loupe. "Is it so unbelievable that I need your help to fight the Nomes? It doesn't mean we have to be friends or anything like that; even Rasp isn't naïve enough to trust me unreservedly."

"But why do you even want to fight the Nomes in the first place?"

"Oz was my home too, in case you've forgotten."

Brollan laughed bitterly. "So you're doing this out of _patriotism?_ Fine time for it, considering how many years you spent trying to destroy Oz. You see what I mean about not understanding you? One minute, you're flying through the sky, cackling like a madwoman, next minute you couldn't be more down to earth if you had weights attached to your feet. You certainly aren't making it easy for me to guess at your motivations- least of all with that cackle of yours."

"Well, if it's any comfort, the feeling's perfectly mutual: I don't understand you either. I mean, you almost got us killed yesterday by waving a gun around the munitions during that little temper tantrum of yours. _And_ you were prepared to let Mombi and the Wheelers kill the Gazelle simply because you couldn't stand to have an Animal in the house. Where's the sense in that?"

"Oh, I could have a few words with you about _your_ temper, Miss Thropp- assuming that's your real name. But you want to know why I'm angry? Fine; I'm angry because I was supposed to be in Munchkinland for half a day at the most; it's now been almost three days and there's a good chance that the very reason I came here in the first place is gone. My business… Our business," he reluctantly acknowledged, "Has most likely been torn to pieces; our offices? Gone. Our factories? Gone. Our client base? Gone. Our _employees?_ Either dead or in hiding. Seventeen years of hard graft flushed down the toilet in the space of a single night!"

"Not to sound callous, but I'm sure everyone here's lost just as much as you have, including friends and family. But what about the anti-Animal prejudice?"

"I'd hardly expect somebody like _you_ to understand."

"Try me."

"Have you ever had to run a business? Have you ever had do the old tightrope walk of keeping the workers safe and keeping the profits moving? Well, I know for a fact that you haven't, so just try to imagine, after fifteen years of peaceful work on the factory floor with as few accidents as possible, you have to rejig almost every single machine in the building to accommodate hooves and paws, _then_ face down the workers who've gotten angry at having to share the assembly line with a pack of livestock- all because Glinda passed a law allowing Animals to take human jobs. That strike almost cost me everything." He sighed wearily. "I do _not_ like losing control of a situation, Miss Thropp."

_In other words, you're not just a speciesist; you're a speciesist with a grudge, _Elphaba thought privately. Outwardly, she offered her best equivalent of an accommodating smile, and remarked, "That makes two of us, then. Well, on the upside, the carpet works well enough. You don't appear to be weighing it down, and the fabric doesn't appear to be shifting under your movements. Now… I can see you're hanging onto the edge of the carpet, so that'll save us some time: when I say the word, I want you to pull the front corners of the carpet upwards."

"Why?"

"You'll see. Who knows- you might get some headway into knowing why I cackle. Now, on three: one… two… _three!"_

Brollan, startled by the volume of Elphaba's shout, instinctively twitched upwards, taking the corners of the carpet with him; instantly, the carpet rocketed into the air at an incredible speed, almost crashing into the ceiling before Brollan, screaming in terror, let go of the corners. For a moment, he lay there, face pressed into the carpet, mumbling and gurgling incomprehensibly. Eventually, he managed to gibber, in a ripe mezzo-soprano, "Help."

"There's nothing to worry about, Mr Brollan; the carpet's still working, so you can get down from there without too much difficulty. Just remember- you're in complete control of the situation."

There was a pause, and then Brollan let out a soprano whimper of, "How do I get down from here?"

"Just turn the corners of the carpet downwards- gently, this time."

Very slowly, Brollan gently turned the corners downward, propelling the carpet slowly but surely towards the floor. But at perhaps seven feet above the ground, curiosity must have overtaken his nervousness, for he gave one corner an experimental twist, whereupon the whole carpet unexpectedly flipped upside down. Once Brollan had stopped screaming, he opened his eyes long enough to realise that he hadn't fallen; he was still sitting on the upside-down carpet, his backside firmly anchored to its surface even as his keys and wallet dangled out of his pockets.

"That's the trouble with carpets," said Elphaba. "You might be able to carry more passengers and cargo on it, but it's a lot harder to grip than the average broomstick, especially for people in the centre; so I decided to cast a few supplementary enchantments to stop us from losing everything if we're ever flipped upside down. I've also cast a number of other useful spells I normally use when enchanting a new broomstick: protection from wind and airborne dust, lessening of ambient noise, that sort of thing."

"Ah," Brollan mumbled, in a tone of voice that indicated that he was far too startled to be rude, "Very comforting. So, when you first went flying out of the Wizard's palace, your broom was enchanted just like this carpet?"

"No, no; back then, it was a lot more rushed and a lot more improvised. In fact, the spell I used to make my first broom fly was supposed to give me wings- or so I thought. By the way, you might want to twist that particular corner to upright yourself."

Slowly, he took hold of the opposite corner of the carpet and gently rotated himself upright. As he once again lowered the levitating rug towards the floor, a strange expression slowly spread across his face, and he asked (somewhat hesitantly), "Can I… keep flying for a while? Just to practice, I mean."

Elphaba smirked. "That was the reason why I asked for a volunteer in the first place," she said.

"Huh?"

"You're being trained as a pilot, Mr Brollan."

* * *

In the last few hours, Basalt had not dared to venture outside Glinda's cell; with the threat of assassination steadily drawing nearer, it simply wasn't safe to leave her unguarded and unsupervised. Thankfully, though, he knew that Lord Scathelex had no control over the structure of the palace, and couldn't simply delete the room and leave Glinda to suffocate; however, after a bit of hurried research on the subject, he also knew that as a member of the War Council, Scathelex had sufficient authority to draw on the services of assassins- highly specialised assassins trained and privileged specifically to kill organic targets.

Almost as concerning was the fact that the assassin's tactics could only be estimated: would he emerge from the wall behind Glinda's desk and attack her directly? Would he wait until she went to bed and launch his attack from beneath the mattress or from the ceiling above it? If he had magical power, would the assassination be just as straightforward, or would it attempt to use a subtler approach? Would it sear all organic life from the chamber with a blast of fire? Would it flood the room with carbon monoxide? And would the assassin also feel it necessary to kill Basalt first?

With no way of telling exactly where the expected intruder would emerge and how it would go about extinguishing Glinda's life, Basalt had decided to remain in the centre of the room, his upper body continually swivelling to allow him a 360˚ view of the walls and ceiling. Meanwhile, Glinda herself was torn between studying the Grimmerie, occasionally helping herself to the tray of food at her side, and staring at Basalt's gently revolving form. "Don't you get dizzy after a while?" she'd asked.

Basalt (who'd read enough about human anatomy to know what "dizziness" was) had assured her that he had no way of becoming disoriented by this activity. For a while, there'd been silence between the two of them, as Glinda reached what he gathered was an especially complicated line; eventually, she leant back in her chair, massaged her temples in exhaustion, and took a heavy draught of her goblet. Then she eyed the goblet with sudden curiosity, and muttered, "I've been sipping from this thing for hours, now, and it's still hot. What is this stuff, anyway, Basalt? I ate and drank some of this when I first arrived, but I never asked what it was."

"It is hot molten silver, Miss Glinda."

Glinda blinked. "Molten silver?" she repeated.

"Yes, Miss Glinda."

"What about the pies?"

"Limestone, Miss Glinda."

There was a pause, as Glinda's skin slowly paled, and her expression went blank. According to Basalt's research, these two factors could indicate several different emotions, including shock, anger, disgust, and many others. Unfortunately, he had no way of identifying which, so he asked, "Have I spoken in error?"

"No, no; it's just that… How… how have I been able to eat and drink any of this without dying or breaking my teeth or something like that?"

Basalt quickly classified the expression as one of "alarm" and answered; "During the construction of the palace, the Nome King placed certain enchantments upon its rooms, allowing foreign dignitaries to ingest and digest Nome food without suffering ill effects." _And thankfully_, Basalt thought,_ none of these enchantments can be reversed by Lord Scathelex._

"Just as well, then," Glinda muttered, her expression registering "relief." She eyed the limestone pies curiously, and asked, "Do you eat this? Regularly, I mean."

"No, Miss Glinda; this food is reserved explicitly for nobles and other high-privilege Nomes. Lesser Nomes such as I are content with dull granite and molten copper to dampen our appetites."

"Oh well; it was a bit silly of me to think you'd be eating toast and hard boiled eggs for breakfast. But can you eat human food at all, though? Have you ever gotten curious about the things you've seen me eating at other times? Cheese, bread, fruit, that sort of - Basalt, are you alright?"

Basalt had gone very still- an instinctive reaction to hearing the mortal name for The Poison. However, there was something else amidst the instinctual revulsion, something new he'd earned in his transition from bodyguard to protector…

Though they were hardly expected to be the most inventive of the Nome King's household, the protectors were also gifted with enough imagination and creativity (in other words, any at all) to bolster their newfound privileges of curiosity and initiative. It was this imagination that had suddenly stirred within Basalt's mind at the mention of the Poison, and slowly, an idea began to form. It was a very hazy idea, with considerable improvisation given to an already fractal theme, but somehow, it made sense.

For the next minute, he remained silent, calculating distances between him and the materials he would need for this strange and unorthodox plan, and trying to decide whether the risks of the plan outweighed the benefits.

_The palace storeroom is twelve floors beneath us; it will take a few seconds to reach. The required materials are sorted in alphabetical order- therefore I must head directly to shelf P24, which will take time to locate. Even with alchemical assistance, it will still take a minute to shape and prepare. Therefore, I must assume that the time I must take to leave accomplish this task would be adequate time for an assassin to infiltrate the room and kill Glinda._ Basalt's brow furrowed with thought. _However, Glinda is skilled enough to defend herself against other Nomes; fighting an assassin in single combat might be beyond her capabilities, but it may allow me the time I need. Of course, to do this, I will have to disobey my orders not to inform Glinda of anything occurring outside her room._

"Miss Glinda," he said at last, "I must go; I will return shortly."

"… Alright then," said Glinda hesitantly. "Are you sure you're alright?"

"I am fine. Thank you for your concern." Then, Basalt, not certain of what he was doing, added, "Miss Glinda, does your wand still function?"

"It did, last time I looked. Why do you ask?"

"You may need it in the next few minutes; there are those in the palace who would prefer it if your work remained unfinished." Then, bound by orders not to elaborate further, he vanished into the floor.

* * *

By the time the others had recovered from their hangovers and gotten down to work, it was almost midday, and Brollan had managed to temporarily conquer both his apparent fear of heights and his general inability to accept orders without complaint, and had apparently mastered the basics of flying a carpet. In fact, he was now attempting some more complicated manoeuvres, flying the carpet around sharp corners and down narrow hallways. Meanwhile, Elphaba had finished enchanting the other carpet, and had selected a second pilot; naturally, since nobody else had wanted to be in the same room as her and Brollan, this second pilot was Brollan's stoic partner, Moleburr.

Once she'd given her basic tutorial of how to fly, she let Brollan take over the training process for a time- much to the relief of both- and went to check on the other refugees. At this point, a good deal of the explosives had been moved into one of the back rooms for Curter (the only qualified industrial alchemist among the refugees) to prepare them for the journey ahead: pausing only to take the boards off the walls so they could avoid any accidents involving candles, he and his team had starting turning the safest of the explosives into grenades, easy-to-set bombs, and makeshift shells for Curter's portable launcher. A brave few were even trying to make replicas of the launcher from lengths of pipe.

Curter himself was surveying the finished items as they arrived, checking the shell casings and clay grenades for leaks, and occasionally turning back to the team to say things like "Put that stuff outside with the rest of the rejects, Jobel," or "I wouldn't leave that in the sun if I were you." Amusingly enough, they were so agitated with the workload that Elphaba's arrival in the room scarcely stirred a ripple; in fact, Curter was the only one who noticed her at all.

"How's it going?" she asked.

"Decently enough," Curter muttered, tapping experimentally on the side of a shell. "Well, it's slow as all hell and nobody knows if we'll even hit anything with the grenades or the shells, but at least nobody's lost a hand yet."

"Yet?"

"Well, that's the problem with this work: everyone wants to get it over and done with as quickly as possible so they can take the fight to the Nomes. The trouble is, impatience killed the alchemist, if you know what I mean… and that's only after it finished painting the room with his blood and gluing his eyeballs to the ceiling… and doing the same to anybody else in spitting distance."

Elphaba sighed; the explosives team weren't the only ones feeling impatient at this point. The barely-suppressed yearning to get out of this mausoleum and into the sky was back, along with the longing to see Fiyero and Glinda again- which, she had to admit, wasn't helped by the fact that she'd spent a good deal of the time between enchantments wondering about them and what the Nomes were doing. She bit back an expletive, and said, "Alright then, assuming nothing goes wrong, how long do you suppose it'll take?"

"Hours." Curter's expression suddenly turned hesitant, and he asked, "How long do you suppose it'll take you to finish working the… erm... the magic? I mean, doing something as serious as that, it's got to take hours as well, right? Drawing the circles in the floor in your own blood, calling upon the grim spirits of beyond and probably binding the elements to your will, too- that's got to be a long and dangerous process, hasn't it?"

"You've been listening to the same rumourmongers as Gnoll, haven't you? Magic isn't usually as complicated as that; I finished enchanting the second carpet a few minutes ago."

"Oh."

"Although," Elphaba admitted, "if you're working with something as cryptic and powerful as the Grimmerie, it can get pretty close."

"Ah."

"It's a bit like working with explosives, really, except you run the risk of accidentally creating a subspecies if you botch a spell."

"I see."

"You're a lot friendlier when you're sober, by the way."

Curter laughed nervously, his tone of voice settling somewhere between embarrassment and terror. "I meant to apologise for what I said last night, by the way," he said. "I was a little drunk, I'll admit that, but not enough to excuse what I said, if you know what I mean…" He stopped, realising that the rest of the explosives team was staring at him, and his ears immediately turned a vivid shade of crimson.

"Apology accepted," said Elphaba, privately wondering why the artilleryman was being so civil; maybe he was just afraid that he'd be the first casualty if she ever went off the deep end again, but most of the refugees were too convinced that she was already plotting her downfall to even bother with that. So what reason could Curter have for being polite?

She turned to leave; but just as she reached the door, Curter added loudly, "I was being serious about redemption, mind you."

There was a sudden clatter of metal as one of the explosives team accidentally knocked over a pair of scales and swore diabolically.

Mentally, Elphaba did the same.

"Would you care to discuss this outside?" she asked, not even bothering to turn around. "I'd rather not have the room explode next time you shout like that."

Once they were out of earshot, she took a deep breath and whispered, "We've had this discussion already, Curter, and as much as I appreciate being spoken to on civil terms, I'd rather not have to repeat it. Okay?"

Curter sighed. "Listen, Elphaba- can I call you that? - I know that you aren't interested in sermons, but this is very serious; what are you going to do when this is all over and done with? If we actually manage to get the Nomes to undo whatever they did to the country and let us start rebuilding, what's going to happen to you, then?"

"I was planning on vanishing and never being seen again," said Elphaba truthfully.

"So you return to the afterlife once your work here is done?"

Elphaba laughed; for almost a minute, she cackled helplessly, at first leaning against the wall, and then slumped bodily against it. "No," she said, once she had gotten her breath back. "I was actually planning on living out the rest of my life in peace, far away from Oz. Truth be told, I wasn't even planning on meeting any Ozians when I arrived back in the country; once I'd learned who was to blame for the invasion and where to find them, I was supposed to have a straightforward flight from the Emerald City to the Nome Dominions- up until you shot me out of the air, of course."

"Can we get back on topic, _please?"_ wheedled Curter. "Haven't you thought of making amends for your crimes and rejoining society? I mean, it might mean having to swallow your pride and apologising for everything you did, and I know that's hardly the easiest thing in the world to do, but spending the rest of your days in hiding and alone and hated by everybody doesn't sound like much of a life to me-"

"I wouldn't be alone and hated by _everybody_, I'd…" Elphaba, remembering herself, hastily changed the subject. "That's not the point; if I wanted a comfortable life and the adoration of the masses, I wouldn't have opposed the Wizard in the first place, would I? So answer me this- if you're so intent on giving me the second chance _you think_ I've been denied, why would I be interested in it?"

"Doesn't _everyone_ want to be forgiven for their past mistakes?"

"Not in the way you suggest, but yes; even I have things I want to make amends for. But why are you so intent on… redeeming me? It just doesn't seem to fit with the rest of your qualifications; industrial alchemist, member of the Experimental Artillery Brigade… and a walking moral compass?"

Once again, Curter's boyish face turned pink. "You might not believe it," he said, "But before I went to university, I was a gnat's wing from becoming a cleric. Everyone else, even the other clerics, they warned me away from it, you see- they told me I had the faith, but not the fervour- so after a lot of soul-searching, I decided to study for a career and remain quietly faithful. But when the Nomes invaded…"

"… You were reborn as Curter the Pious, Holy Artilleryman and Redeemer of the Wicked Witch of the West," finished Elphaba, barely managing to keep the contempt from her voice. "My father might have gotten on well with you, Curter."

"The Unnamed God isn't as judgemental as the hardliners claim, Elphaba. Not all of the believers agreed with the angry mobs when they claimed you could never be forgiven. Only _most _of us," he conceded, "but my point is, you need to realise that you've been given a chance that few people ever get- _another chance at life_, and with none of the weaknesses you had then_._ I don't care what power brought you back from the dead, but you can't just squander this opportunity by hiding yourself away in the shadows as soon as you finish whatever business you returned to finish. You said yourself you wanted to be forgiven- why not seek forgiveness among the living? I'm not saying you have to convert; this can be…" He foundered for a moment, before eventually suggesting, "A _secular_ redemption, if you like."

There was a pause, as Elphaba considered this; eventually, she smiled. "I may have been mistaken, Curter: I don't think father would have gotten on with you at all... And I mean that as a compliment." Of course," she continued, "It doesn't mean I agree with you, and I'd recommend actually trying to learn what I want to make amends _for_ before insisting on penitence, but… for better or for worse, your heart's in the right place."

"You make it sound like that doesn't count for much."

"Not in Oz, it doesn't," said Elphaba sadly. "But I think we've talked enough for now; I've got to make sure that Brollan and Moleburr don't end up hanging in tatters from the chandelier, and you've got to keep your team from accidentally blowing up the house."

* * *

Countless miles away, something sleek and bladed rippled through a solid rock wall and slid noiselessly onto the floor of Glinda's room.

The assassin had arrived.

Nobody noticed him: as far as outside observers could tell, Basalt had left the room perhaps twenty to thirty minutes ago, and Glinda was lying in bed, evidently fast asleep. There were no hostile sentries assigned to the room, nor were there any indications that anybody was watching it via magic. Of course, as the lights had been dimmed for Glinda's benefit, it would have been difficult for anyone to see it anyway, and the assassin's enchanted obsidian skin upgraded "difficult" to "almost impossible."

Slowly, the assassin approached the bed, his clawed feet appearing to glide eerily across the stone floor; insulated by sound-dampening spells, his footsteps were completely inaudible. In fact, the only sound he made at all was the low hiss of blades being tested against air.

Two hollow-looking stone eyes glared down at the figure on the bed, examining the face just to make sure that this really was Glinda Upland. Then, his inspection complete, the assassin raised one daggerlike index finger over the target's neck and began to slowly lower it towards the jugular vein.

"Excuse me, but could I please have your attention for a moment?"

The assassin turned with eyewatering speed, and found itself face to face with Basalt, who was returning the lights to their normal brilliance- without taking his eyes off the assassin, of course. He was also holding something in his right fist.

"This isn't the best time to be a professional, friend," said the assassin, a mouth unexpectedly emerging from the lower half of his smooth black face. "I've been permitted to kill this target's defenders should they get in the way. Now please, step outside and let me get back to work."

"Would you really be willing to commit treason and kill one of the King's personal guests?"

"If the Council pays, I'd do anything they asked and more." The roughly-carved mouth smiled. "Hardly treasonous to oppose the King if the Council orders it."

"I have something here that might change your mind," said Basalt, holding up his closed right fist.

The assassin's smile broadened. "If it's a cease-and-desist from the King," he began, "I doubt I'll be impressed-"

Basalt opened his fist.

There was a horrified pause, as the assassin stared disbelievingly at the thing sitting in Basalt's stone palm: it was something that had been feared and dreaded in Nome culture for hundreds of thousands of years, a substance that could erode their bodies and destroy their souls in a matter of seconds, a material so unholy and destructive that few could even believe that on the surface it occurred naturally. Experiments had been conducted on it, spells had been invented to defend against it, and there'd even been a few wild attempts to destroy its sources- all to no avail. And now, Glinda's bodyguard was currently holding a sample of the deadliest poison known to Nomekind in his hand.

'"You wouldn't," the assassin whispered. "You wouldn't dare bring… _that_ into the palace. You wouldn't risk what would happen if it broke…"

"Wouldn't I? I have been ordered to defend Glinda with my life. If I must risk death or even suffer death in order to serve the King, then I am more than prepared to make the necessary sacrifice. Are you? Be warned that if you make another move towards the bed, I will break this against your face."

It took a while for the stunned assassin to find his voice, but when he did, a remnant of his old cockiness could be heard in it. "I don't _need_ to make another move," he sneered. "All I've got to do is sweep my hand backwards, and she dies. You made a big mistake in letting me get this close to her, Protector."

"You made an even bigger one in thinking I was asleep," said Glinda.

The assassin wheeled around to find himself face to face with Glinda's wand, glowing with enough energy to rip clean through his obsidian body; for a moment, his claws twitched, as though he imagined he could move faster than the first blast of magic. Then he glanced over his shoulder, and realised that Basalt was now standing right behind him, ready to smash the Poison into the back of his head. For a moment, the assassin looked as though he was considering an escape through the floor; then Basalt's hand clamped down on his shoulder.

"Ah," he said softly.

"I hope I don't need to tell you not to move," said Glinda pleasantly. "I'd hate to see what would happen if Basalt actually had to use- well, whatever it is he's holding- on you."

"You don't seem too concerned about what would happen if you were to use that wand of yours on me."

"Of course not- I already know what would happen if I did something like that: your head would explode. Simple as that."

"I see. Will you accept my surrender?"

"Maybe." There was a note of teasing in Glinda's voice. "Basalt," she asked, "Is our guest going to be missed by anyone?"

Basalt nodded. "Lord Scathelex will be expecting a report from him; in the event that we kill this assassin, his master will merely notice the absence and send another- perhaps a team of them, he believes you are dangerous enough."

"Fair enough. Good news, Mr Assassin- your head _isn't_ going to explode."

"Very generous of you," conceded the assassin. "What exactly do you want me to do?"

"Simple: I want you to go back to your boss and tell him that he couldn't find me anywhere on this floor, and that Basalt's probably hidden me away somewhere outside the palace."

A sly grin crossed the assassin's face. "Just speaking rhetorically- what's to stop me from telling Lord Scathelex the truth?"

"The fact that, as a Protector, I have the right to access the personnel records of every single subject of the Nome Dominions," intoned Basalt. "I know the route you take to reach mission briefings, and know where you spend most of your free time; most importantly, I know where you prepare your meals. Also, the moment you leave this cell, I have a contingent of spies ready to follow you to ensure that you tell your master only as much as Miss Glinda allows you to tell."

The grin vanished. "Just checking. Can I go now?"

"So long as you remember: you are being watched. Now go."

The Assassin nodded solemnly, and melted smoothly into the floor, leaving Glinda and Basalt apparently alone in the room. A minute of silence passed between the two of them, eventually broken by Glinda whispering, "Behind me, right?"

"Most likely."

Glinda nodded, and pointed her wand at the wall behind her: a moment later, the enraged assassin appeared in it, claws drawn and an expression of blistering hatred etched upon his almost featureless skull- until he realised that he was once again staring down the length of a magic wand. "Gods damn it," he hissed, wearily. "I would have thought that you'd have the decency to let down your guard after accepting my surrender."

"The last time I did something like that," said Glinda, "I was lucky enough to get to a hospital without bleeding to death. So I've got to ask- did this Lord Scathelex even think to ask the King just how many assassination attempts I've dodged in the last year before sending you here? Did you even bother to ask _who_ you were being sent to kill?"

"The Generals of the War Council don't have to ask anything of the king, and _I_ don't answer to uppity fleshlings who- OW! What was that for?"

"A correction," said Basalt, shaking chunks of shattered obsidian from his fist. "For the moment, you _do_ answer to Miss Glinda. If you do not feel that the wand is a sufficient threat, then I can always use-"

"No! I get your point, I get your point. Look, can I just leave, now? I promise I won't try and attack you again, and I promise to deliver your message to Lord Scathelex."

Glinda nodded. "Be on your way… and don't forget what Basalt said- the walls have eyes, and they're all watching _you."_

Once the assassin was gone and Basalt's crew of borrowed spies had confirmed that he was heading in the general direction of the withdrawing rooms, Glinda finally released the breath she'd been holding for the past fifteen seconds. "That," she said, sitting down heavily on the bed, "was interesting."

"Are you alright, Miss Glinda?"

"I'm fine, I'm just a little shaken- that's all. Do you know," she added, thoughtfully, "That's only about the second time in the last year or so that someone's actually tried to assassinate me at close range? They tried shooting me, they tried bombing me, but after the first knifing, they never tried it again. At least this one wasn't after me for being a personal friend to the Wicked Witch of the West."

Basalt detected "bitterness" and "anger" in Glinda's voice, and decided to remain tactfully silent.

"Why is this Lord Scalpel or whatever his name is trying to kill me? Can't the King just order him to back down?"

"I am not certain; from what little I have been able to observe, there seems to be some conflict between the War Council and His Majesty- some involving issues of leadership, others involving your work. Apparently, Scathelex objects to the fact that His Majesty wants to... become human."

"Knowing why the King wants it, I can hardly blame Scathing."

"Scathelex," corrected Basalt, once again regretting the fact that he'd averted his ears from the King's explanation.

"Just one more question- what were you using to scare the assassin?"

Without saying a word, Basalt opened his right fist to display the thing that he had been concealing in it. "It is merely a replica," he explained, "made of plaster and paint, both quick-dried with alchemical flame, but convincing enough to fool the assassin nonetheless."

"So this is why you left earlier? You were making this and hoping to scare off an assassin with it?"

"Yes."

Glinda reached out and gently took the plaster fakery from Basalt's cavernous palm. "I don't get it," she said. "Why would he be scared of an egg?"

* * *

Half an hour later, Glinda and Basalt looked up from their work (Glinda from her translation of the Grimmere, Basalt from reading a book on human behaviour) at the sound of rumbling in the distance, followed by cries of "All hail His Majesty!" Minutes later, the Nome King marched smoothly through the wall of the cell, a satisfied look on his face.

"**No deaths in my absence, it would seem,"** he said happily. **"How goes your study, Glinda?"**

"I think I'm almost halfway there," she said. "There's still a lot of work to be done on keeping the spell variables from getting out of control, though."

"**Take all the time you need; I know how chaotic the spells from the Grimmerie can be, and I'd very much prefer that my human form kept its internal organs internal. In the meantime, I've noticed quite a few of the distinguished Lord Scathelex's personal servants running about the palace on spying duty, rather than attending to his Lordship. Tell me, Basalt, have there been any assassination attempts?"**

"Only one, Your Majesty: Glinda and I managed to persuade him to leave with little incident."

"**Truly? How did you manage this?"**

By way of explanation, Basalt held up the plaster egg.

Very slowly, the King's face went slack. **"Well now,"** he said slowly, **"I know for a fact that there is absolutely **_**nobody**_** in the Dominions stupid enough to actually bring one of those into the palace, so would I be right in assuming that's a fake?"**

"Absolutely, Your Majesty."

"**Just as well then."** The King gently took the egg from Basalt and examined it carefully, turning it over in his hands and occasionally tapping its surface.** "Yes," **he murmured, the smile edging back across his face. **"Very clever. You've exceeded all expectations, Basalt; congratulations are in order- perhaps even another promotion. Of course, it may have to wait until after I've gotten our resident member of the War Council under control, but all good things come to those who wait, as they say. Keep up the good work, both of you."**

As the King strolled out of the room, a thought suddenly struck Basalt: for some time, now, he'd been wondering about _why_ His Majesty would want to become a human, what purpose it might serve, or even how he'd thought of it in the first place- in other words, everything Basalt had missed during that initial conversation, along with a few things that Scathelex had mentioned. And now that the King was back in the palace, most obvious solution was, of course, _just asking._

"Your Majesty!" he called, hurrying through the wall after him.

The King, who was almost halfway down the corridor by that stage, turned. **"Was there something else you needed to tell me**?" he asked.

"Just one question, Your Majesty- about your plan…"

"**Yes?"**

"Why do you want to… to become _human_?"

"**Basalt, you were in the same room when I told Glinda of it in the first place. Why do I need to tell you again?"**

"I was averting my ears, Your Majesty; I spent most of that conversation hiding in the wall."

The King sighed deeply. **"Oh yes, counterproductive reverence in action. I did wonder why you didn't join us at the table even when I'd prepared a third goblet for you. Never mind; if you must know, the reason why I want to become a human being is because I have recently come into possession of a set of artefacts that…" **He hesitated. **"Perhaps it would be more appropriate if you learned the answers for yourself,"** he said at last. **"Consider it a personal development project- another step towards your next promotion. After all, it's not as if you're unequipped for the task."**

"But what of my duties in protecting Miss Glinda?"

"**There will be no more assassination attempts while I am in the palace, Basalt; you'll still have your regular inspections to contend with, but other than that, you'll have all the free time you'll need to investigate. Oh, and another thing- just to make this a proper challenge, you are not permitted to ask Glinda. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have an appointment to keep with Lord Scathelex to keep. Good day…"**

As the King drifted away, this time taking a shortcut through the nearest wall, Basalt belatedly realised that he'd forgotten to inform him of Scathelex's remark about the "abominations" being dumped in Northern Munchkinland.

What exactly had that meant, anyway? Could he use this mystery as a starting point for his personal development project? And more importantly, could he learn enough about Ozian geography to navigate Munchkinland without requesting a guide?

* * *

**"Lord Scathelex."**

"Your Majesty."

There was a deathly silence as the two Nomes regarded each other: Scathelex, with his spindly custom-made body of marble and gold; the King, with his craggy, heavyset body of rough granite, with only the tines of his crown and his rudimentary beard to distinguish him from the rank and file.

Staring back at him, Scathelex could scarcely imagine anyone more plain and uninteresting outside of the servant class; even the King's predecessor, Roquat the Red, a Nome so senile and disconnected from reality that he could scarcely concentrate on anything outside his library by the end of his reign, had at least had the decency to customize his body with the ostentation one would expect from the ruler of Nomekind. Of course, given that most of the current King's time was spent snooping around behind the collective backs of the entire War Council, perhaps it was fitting that he chose a more unassuming exterior.

_But what do you want, really?_ Scathelex wondered. _What attraction does humanity hold for you?_

"**I trust you're finding the drawing rooms comfortable enough,"** said the King. **"You haven't been greatly inconvenienced on my account, I hope."**

_Well, we've lost a very large plot of valuable territory to one of your mad schemes, you've been trying to transform yourself into a human being with the aid of an Ozian POW, and my one attempt to stop your insanity from consuming any more of the Council's precious resources has gone awry thanks to my assassin being unable to locate one imprisoned witch and her overpromoted bodyguard. But apart from that, no, I don't feel remotely inconvenienced at all._

Out loud, Scathelex shook his head. "I admit, I would have preferred to have held this meeting outside, in the caverns."

"**You don't like the palace?"**

"Your Majesty, if nothing else, I am a dutiful representative of the War Council; we pride ourselves on following the traditions of Nomekind to the letter, and replacing the seat of power in the caves of the earth with a constructed palace strikes us as… _conspicuously _untraditional."

"**I've replaced nothing, Lord Scathelex; I've merely built a home for myself and my household. Besides,"** the King added with sudden venom, **"it's not as if you consider this the true seat of power in the Nome Dominions, do you? If you did, you'd never have let me get past the planning stage; as far as you and the War Council are concerned, I'm just a figurehead with the occasional bright idea- the heir of a powerless ruler with nothing to rule."**

Scathelex blinked; this was not what he had expected. In the meetings in which he'd proposed the attack on Oz, the King had appeared to be everything the Council could have hoped for in a King: well-mannered, self-effacing, and ultimately subservient to their demands. Apart from his rather eccentric move to lead the troops from the front line, and his even more outrageous desire to become a human, he'd never shown signs of true defiance in the face of a Council representative.

"Your Majesty," Scathelex began, "I think we may have gotten off on the wrong foot-"

"**We **_**might,"**_ snarled the King. **"We just **_**might,**_** my little peon. Just a few seconds ago, you accused me of disobeying the traditions of Nomekind when the War Council has been- against tradition- taking control of non-military affairs in the Nome Dominions over the course of the last few years. Earlier today, you tried to have my most important prisoner assassinated. Four days ago, you tried to borrow members of my personal guard for a battlefield unit that would never see combat. Two weeks ago, when I suggested the attack on Oz, you suggested a full psychological evaluation. Frankly, our relationship has been nothing but a long string of you getting off on the wrong foot… and that includes the casual syphoning of magic from me, and allowing the Blessed Emeralds to slip from our grasp."**

"In case Your Majesty must be reminded, that was over twenty years ago: Roquat the Red was in power at that time, not y-"

The King's fist caught Scathelex hard under the chin, flinging him across the withdrawing room and into a solid granite table.

"**It occurs to me,"** the King mused, **"that you could have pretended to be innocent. You could have claimed that what happened was an accident. Instead, I get "that was over twenty years ago." Is that really all you have to say to me?"**

"You _hit _me!" yelled Scathelex, too indignant to be afraid. "You don't dare strike a representative of the War Council!"

"**Don't I?"** Magical energy pulsed out the Nome King, lifting Scathelex off the ground and flinging him across the room. **"Last I looked,"** the King mused aloud, as another wave of magic tossed Scathelex against the ceiling**, "the War Council wasn't in the palace, nor were they aware of your current attempts at assassination…"** He smiled up at the council representative, who was now being rhythmically pounded headfirst into the fresco. **"… And something tells me that they aren't even aware of your presence in the building. Rather fortuitous, wouldn't you say?"**

Scathelex wasn't interested in answering: he didn't know how long the King had been planning this rebellion, what he hoped to accomplish, or even why he was confusing Roquat's reign with his own. All he needed to know was he had to strike now before this maniac killed him; the Council would understand- they'd select a new King from the ranks of the military, and all would be right with the world.

So_,_ gathering his powers, Scathelex returned fire: his ornamental quills, bent by their impact with the table, suddenly crackled with vivid blue sparks as concussive force roared from the palms of his hands, thundering against the King's flesh with all the compacted force of a runaway freight train. This was a technique Scathelex had actually tested in battle against humans and Nomes: human skeletons were all but liquefied by the blast, and Nome bodies simply exploded into inert rubble- unable to reform themselves.

So he was rather surprised when the shattered pieces of the King began to reassemble themselves. From somewhere amongst the rubble, something that bore a vague resemblance to a mouth laughed obscenely: **"Did you think that the advance of the forests across Oz was entirely due to Glinda's aid?"** it cackled. **"Did you truly think that I spent the Battle for the Emerald City twiddling my thumbs while my troops did all the hard work, too afraid to show my face without the magic to protect it? For their sake, I hope that the rest of the War Council isn't nearly as stupid as you."**

Faced with his opponent recovering from an apparently lethal injury, and armed with no other spells that could really affect Nomes, Scathelex turned and ran for his life.

Less than fifteen feet into the wall, a tendril of magic wrapped around him and dragged him back into the ruins of the withdrawing room and directly into the path of the King's reassembled fist. **"I wouldn't be leaving so soon,"** he purred. **"I haven't even started on you just yet."**

This time, Scathelex fired his entire arsenal of magic: he flung fireballs, he projected lightning from his golden eyeballs, and he also tried two or three more concussive blasts for good measure; he spat acid, he exhaled clouds of explosive energy, he enchanted the light fixtures to come to his rescue, he even commanded his golden quills to launch themselves at his attacker. He knew none of it would kill the king, but he didn't need to- all he needed to do was to force the him to release him- if only so he could escape from whoever or whatever the King had become in his growing insanity, to reach another General and warn the council of the danger he now posed. No matter how powerful the King had become behind their backs, he couldn't possibly stand before their collective might.

Unfortunately, the King didn't flinch under the barrage; instead, he countered by opening his cavernous jaws and belching a stream of fire that washed over Scathelex's arms and body, heating them to colossal levels. And because he'd crafted his body to detect pain rather than actively feel it, Scathelex could only stare in horror as his arms, already glowing bright orange in the intense heat, began to drip, then run, then ooze off his torso altogether. And the rest of his body was still to follow.

"WAIT!" Scathelex shouted desperately. "WAIT!"

The stream of fire abated, and after clearing his throat, the King rumbled, **"Have you something important to tell me, or are you just pleading for mercy?"**

"Your Majesty, I beg you- _think about what you're doing._ The Council might not know I've arrived here, but they won't be delayed forever: when they'll return and find me dead, they'll-"

"**Execute me? Oh they would indeed. But you see, by the time they arrive, it'll be far too late for them to do anything about. Times are changing faster than you think, Scathelex; the reign of the War Council is ending, and soon, the reign of King Roquat shall begin again!"**

Scathelex's marble eyesockets widened in surprise. "You mean… you're… you really are… you faked your death?"

"**I faked **_**nothing**_**." **The King's fist rose over Scathelex's defenceless face, swarming with magical power. **"Sleep well in oblivion, My Lord; may your fellow Generals join your slumber soon."**

The second last thing that went through Scathelex's mind was a whimper of, _but I'm only two hundred and fifty, I'm too young to die!_

The very last thing to go through his mind was, of course, the King's right fist.

* * *

"What in the name of Oz is _wrong _with you? You want your head to explode or somethin'? Point the soddin' launcher away from your soddin' skull and point it at the soddin' target! Yes, Mr McKordrek, what is it?"

"Uh, Woolwax, why aren't we using ammunition in these launchers?"

"Because, in case you were stuck behind the door when they were handin' out brains, we can't afford to waste any of it, and because you'd probably blow your head off if you were given anything remotely explosive! Besides, these makeshift launchers work well enough- if they're good enough for young Curter, they're good enough for you!"

"I'm not arguing that or anything, it's just that I feel… well, a bit silly pointing this thing at the bullseye, preparing a dud shell and shouting "bang!" that's all."

"You just be happy for that, my friend, because in a day, we'll be fighting against a real enemy that doesn't sit still, and you'll be using a weapon that will explode if you hold it the wrong way. So you just count your blessings, point the launcher at the target, and shout "bang" proudly and happily when I give the order! The rest of you- TEN-_SHUN!_ READYYYYYYYY _ARMS!_ NOT _THOSE_ ARMS, YOU TRIPLE-HEADED DINGLEBERRY!"

"Sorry, sir."

"Again! READYYYYYY _ARMS! _SHOULDEEEER ARMS! READY! AIM… _FIRE AT WILL!"_

"Bang!"

"Bang!"

"Bang!"

"PUT A BIT OF BLOODY ENTHUSIASM INTO IT!"

"BANG!"

"BANG!"

"MUCH BETTER! NOW RELOAD! WHAT IS IT, MISS JASPERS?"

"Sir, could you please lower your voice? I think I may be suffering from tinnitus."

"LISTEN, YOU… what's that noise?"

There was a long and embarrassed silence, as the entire bombardier squad slowly turned towards the source of the noise: it turned out to be Elphaba, half-slumped against the wall, paralysed with laughter. Rasp was standing next to her, trying valiantly not to join in.

"How… how m-many years has it been since you were discharged from the guard?" he asked, once he had gotten his voice under control.

"Five," grumbled Woolwax. "Of course, it wouldn't matter if it had been fifty- the old sergeant-major's patter never really leaves you. In the meantime, what brings our Acting Governor and pet witch among the bombardiers?"

"For a start," said Elphaba, who was too amused to be annoyed, "I'm nobody's pet. Secondly, the flying carpets are ready to go; we'll be gathering outside in five minutes."

"What's the hurry?"

By way of answering, Rasp drew a battered fob watch from his jacket; "It's almost four-thirty," he said. "I'd rather get in the air while we still have enough light to see where we're going."

"Fair enough," Woolwax conceded. "Alright ladies and gents, let's get moving now- on your feet and outside, on the double! _Hup_-one-two-three…"

Five short minutes later, the refugees gathered just outside the manor; Elphaba had managed to clear a few of the trees- enough to give them room to set up the two flying carpets, both of which were now loaded with all the supplies they would need- from food to heavy munitions. And, astonishingly enough, there was still enough room for about six to seven people on each carpet.

Unfortunately, nobody wanted to board them, because everyone, including both the pilots, was waiting for Elphaba to take the opportunity to kill them all in one go the moment they reached a certain height. The fact that she was flying in her own broomstick instead of one of the carpets didn't help her case much- even though the refugees would probably be even more reluctant to use the carpets if she was a passenger in one of them. And there were also several people who were terrified of magic on general principle, who refused to climb aboard anything that was already floating three feet off the ground.

"Look," said Rasp exasperatedly, "This is the only way we can reach the Nomes and mount a counterattack; it's either this, chopping through this forest over the next decade or so, or just staying in the mansion to survive on rats and anything else you can scavenge from this place. I mean, it's a nice place to live for a few days, I suppose, but it's already in poor condition, and it's only going to get worse the longer we stay here. Do you want to raise your children here? Do you want to see them suffer in trying to eke out a…" Rasp took a deep breath, and threw up his hands. "Oh, screw it," he muttered, and clambered aboard the nearest of the two carpets. "See? It's perfectly safe!"

A long silence followed.

"_Well?"_

Very slowly, Gnoll took a seat on the carpet.

"As I was saying," said Rasp, "This carpet is completely and totally safe. Can we get going now?"

Somewhere in the distance, crickets chirped. Far closer, Elphaba stifled a laugh. "I think there might be an issue of trust somewhere at work here," she said.

"Oh shut up," grumbled Woolwax.

"Would it make any difference if I got on?" asked Brollan, helpfully.

"Probably not. We can't fly it without you, so you _have_ to go."

"Then why don't you get on?"

Curter, who was now wearing a small backpack of ammo alongside the harness for his launcher, sighed, and took a seat on the carpet. "Can we get on with it?" he asked, wearily. "There are some things even _I _don't have the patience for."

Slowly, the refugees began boarding; all in all, perhaps four or five decided to stay behind to guard the children. However, the surprising thing was that the Gazelle wasn't one of them.

"Sorry, but I'm not interest in spending another minute in that dust-clogged mausoleum while the country needs saving," he'd said emphatically. "I admit, I might not be the most useful member of the team, but if you actually need a fast-moving distraction, all you've got to do is hurl me over the side."

"Just try and stop us," Brollan muttered under his breath.

"I'm sure it won't come to that," said Rasp. "So, shall we get going then? Miss Thropp, I believe you know the way to the Nomes from here- you go first."

Elphaba, who had already mounted her broom, offered the wickedest grin she could possibly offer, and kicked off, soaring high into the afternoon sky. Barely bothering to check if the others were following her, she flung back her head and let out a maniacal shriek of laughter.

At long last, they were moving.

Soon, they would be in Nome territory.

And soon… she'd see Fiyero and Glinda again.


	18. Abominations

A/N: Realising that the chapter I was working on approached novella length, I took a chainsaw to it in the interests of keeping the issues in one half from bleeding over into the next. This is the first half, and I hope you enjoy it.

Oh, and to LoveBroadway1510; I recall your review in which you wondered if the Nome spies were a reference to _1984_. Well, it's taken months, but I've finally managed to find the opportunity to make a true reference to _1984_. See if you can spot it- it'll be a line of dialogue. Thank you for your reviews!

Disclaimer: Wicked does not belong to me. And with any luck, it never will; I can honestly say that I'd probably mess it up.

* * *

"I'm not saying we're going to get lost, I'm just saying that without a compass, we might be heading in any direction _but_ east."

"How hard can it be? All we need to do is keep flying until we reach the Deadly Desert; if it takes any longer than five to six hours, we'll know we're going in the wrong direction. I mean, back in your reign of terror, I'd imagine you didn't spend every other minute hovering in mid-air, consulting a map and compass."

"No, I didn't, and you know why? Because I had _landmarks:_ cities, towns, villages, roads, rivers, fortloads of trigger-happy guardsmen, that sort of thing. When I returned to Oz, I found that half of my old landmarks had been destroyed; when Mombi fed me the directions, all I had was the Emerald City, the Yellow Brick Road, and the… the Gale house. Now, it's all covered in forest, and the only thing I can rely on is which horizon the sun rises and sets at. Just look at where we landed: nothing but trees, trees, trees, and- oh look!- more trees, and even once we've flown above them, there's a very good chance we won't remember the direction we were supposed to be going in. All in all, we might be at a serious disadvantage. In fact, even if we do make it as far as the Deadly Desert and beyond, we might never find any Nomes to wage this guerrilla war of ours against."

"Has anyone ever told you how pessimistic you are when you're on the ground? What happened to the cackling girl who led us into the air, screaming "Fly My Pretties, Fly!" eh?"

"You'll see her again when we get back in the air. Assuming you're not suffering from another bout of airsickness. Is that why you're against airborne navigation, by the way?""

Rasp sighed, and took a sizeable bite out of the cooked quail he'd been nibbling at for the past half hour. "This," he mumbled between mouthfuls, "actually tastes a lot better than I thought it would taste. I'm just glad we managed to find that bag of salt back in the manor, or we'd never have been able to give it the slightest bit of flavour."

It was currently six o'clock in the morning, and the refugees that weren't still asleep were currently huddled around the hottest fire Elphaba could conjure without injuring any of them, and helping themselves to a meagre breakfast of fruit and biscuits, plus whatever birds they'd managed to shoot. None of them liked their current camping ground; after all, in a world the Nomes had conquered and remade, anything from the trees to their own shadows could be hiding some kind of enemy. In fact, some of the refugees had only fallen asleep out of sheer terror that they might actually be _awake_ when the Nomes emerged from beneath them to chew on their viscera.

Others, of course, had refused to even put head to pillow without Woolwax marching up and down outside, armed with Curter's launcher and a bag of shells.

Elphaba hadn't found it easy to sleep, herself; on the moments when she wasn't worrying about Fiyero and Glinda, she kept hearing strange noises in the distance, and no matter how often she tried to tell herself it was just the usual sounds you'd hear in a forest at night, she kept imagining the craggy figures of Nomes spying their campfire from a distance, and slowly drifting towards them like sharks towards a crowded beach.

And then, once she'd finally managed to actually close her eyes and sleep, she'd started having nightmares. For added irony, none of them were about what lurked beyond the lights of the camp.

Instead, Elphaba had found herself dreaming of Fiyero and Glinda; in every single nightmare, they were imprisoned somewhere deep inside Nome territory, dangling by their hands from a rock ceiling above the mouth of some enormous-jawed monstrosity or squeezed inside a coffin-like chamber or even being passed across an endless crowd of giggling, razor-fingered monsters, each one promising a more horrific torture to the two of them as it lacerated them. Twice, Elphaba awoke from these dreams sweating, shivering and feeling as though she'd died in her sleep, and the only thing that made the whole thing slightly bearable was the fact that Gnoll had once again fallen asleep on watch, thus sparing her a great deal of embarrassment.

The last dream she had- before waking up to the sound of refugees whining that the fire wouldn't start- was almost pleasant, if a bit strange: in fact, the entire dream seemed to consist of five minutes hovering around a single room and observing its contents. She remembered luxurious furniture and fine wood-panelled walls, and a massive oak desk; she even remembered the figure that sat behind it- a tall, bearded man dressed in an immaculate suit… and a very distinctive ruby ring on his little finger. He was turning something over in his hands, something that, even with the blurry fog that usually surrounded her dreams, could still be recognised as a key.

And there was magic in this room as well, a very subtle and enigmatic sort that was being directed into the man behind the desk; Elphaba couldn't be sure, but something about this magic felt as though someone was controlling the man- or using him as a telescope into whatever strange world she was dreaming of. There was another outpouring of magic somewhere nearby, so weak she could barely sense it; in fact, Elphaba got so caught up in trying to decipher the origins of the two different magicks that she barely heard anything of what was going on in the background- the man asking questions, and a child's voice answering.

Of course, most of it was hopelessly muddled by the fog, but right at the end of the dream, Elphaba caught the words, "The Tin Man was human, once," and realised that the conversation was about Oz. Then of course, the dream ended, leaving her awake and with even more questions than before, along with a navigation issue to clear up.

She sighed. "It never ends," she muttered.

"It could be worse," said Rasp, brightly. "It could be raining, for a start."

"… Did you _really_ just say that?"

"Sorry."

"Never mind; don't worry about it. With our luck, it won't be rain at all- it'll be apple-sized hailstones and midair explosions… or an ambush."

* * *

They'd been travelling for what felt like days, now, lurching awkwardly across the ruined countryside on their malformed limbs, or being carried by those strong enough to do so; the largest and healthiest of them, Oxen, was virtually _covered_ in those who had fallen by the wayside, his gigantic shoulders clustered with those too infirm to move under their own power.

Against all expectations, their southerly march had actually made some progress, even as the landscape itself changed around them. They'd done their best to avoid these changes, because their misbegotten forms would have surely been torn apart by the growth of new trees, and sure enough, they'd lost at least five of their number before they finally encountered something the trees simply refused to grow on or in: a lake. Mercifully, the freezing water had numbed the pain and cleaned their wounds enough for them to stagger onwards once the growth had ended.

For a time, they lingered there, before carrying on, with Lord Eldrect taking the lead, as he had when they'd still been his retinue. None of them were certain where they were going, or even what they hoped to accomplish, but it had to be better than staying in the pit and dying. Eventually, though, one of them had to voice their concerns, and this duty fell to a semi-boneless thing clinging to Oxen's back like the world's ugliest barnacle:

"Are we… returning?"

"There can be no returning," whispered Lord Eldrect. Ever since the alteration, he'd always whispered; perhaps his vocal cords had failed to develop adequately, or perhaps his lungs were too weak to give his voice adequate volume. Whatever the case, he never spoke any louder than a quiet murmur, and today was no exception. "We would not be welcomed back," he continued, "or even recognised by the border patrols; we have nothing to reclaim there, and nothing awaiting us but the King."

This time, it was Oxen who spoke, the Siege-Breaker's deep voice shaking leaves from the trees above them. "Then should there not be… revenge?" he boomed, cracking his knuckles.

But Eldrect only laughed hoarsely, until his chuckling abruptly gave way to a series of loud, wheezing coughs. For fifteen seconds, he leant against Oxen's leg and coughed, until he was almost bent double; finally, he stopped, retched, and spat out a mouthful of blood and other less-identifiable things. The others stared at it in mingled disgust and fascination: some of them had never seen blood before in their lives, and to them, the sudden spray of reddish-black upon the ground was as extraordinary as it was revolting.

"There can be no revenge against the King," said Eldrect sadly. "He is too powerful for us, and even if we could bring him down, we cannot burrow beneath the Deadly Desert to attack him- not anymore. We are denied everything, even the embrace of the earth. All that remains... is an ending."

Some of them rumbled in discontent at this declaration, and eventually, one of the simplest of the crippled asked the question that none of his more advanced fellows wanted to ask: "Will it be soon?"

One of the crippled who wasn't dangling from Oxen's shoulders began to laugh, a high-pitched maniacal chortling that sliced viciously into defenceless eardrums and lacerated the nerves. Weeks ago, he'd been one of the Royal Librarians, respected for his knowledge and his mastery of the magical arts; now, he was a giggling ruin of twisted limbs, inverted jawbones and torn flesh, hovering five feet above the ground to spare his broken legs from the journey.

"We are the dead," he laughed. "We are the dead. We are… abominations. The ending will not be gentle, and it will not be quick."

They continued south in silence, apart from the odd groan of pain, and the occasional delirious giggle from the Librarian; then again, this could hardly be complained about: all of them were in pain, and all of them were delirious to some extent… and most of them were growing angrier by the minute, Oxen being the worst. Every so often, he would howl with frustration and swing his fists wildly at surrounding trees, snapping them like matchsticks.

Eventually, they stopped at the ruins of an old stone hut that had proved too well-built for the growing forests to destroy altogether: most of them were able to squeeze awkwardly through the front door and huddle inside, but there simply wasn't enough room for Oxen and the Librarian as they were. Once upon a time, this would have been easy to solve, but their ability to change their size had been lost- along with their old bodies and several pints of their new vital fluids.

So, the two of them were left outside, one of them furious at everything, the other barely capable of discerning the difference between reality and delirious fantasy. Neither of them had anything to say to each other, and neither of them had any realistic way of making the hours flow any quicker, so it didn't take them very long to notice the three distinctive shapes rocketing across the sky…

* * *

On the upside, the refugees finally knew how far they were from the Deadly Desert; on the downside, they'd discovered that Brollan's apparent fear of heights really was just "apparent," and in reality, he was a hopeless acrophile.

Nobody had expected the cantankerous businessman to get so enthusiastic about flying, but he had, and as they finally descended to a safe altitude, Elphaba was beginning to regret making him a pilot- hence why she was currently flying as close to Brollan's carpet as possible. This was partly to keep an eye on him, but mostly so she could remain inside the field of the sound limiter spell she'd placed around the carpet: here, the roaring of the wind and other ambient noise was lowered to comfortable levels, allowing the passengers to talk at normal volume.

"Let's not try any more mad stunts," she said firmly.

"I don't know why _you're _being such a killjoy," grumbled Brollan. "A minute ago, you were laughing even harder than I was."

"Yes, but that was before I noticed I was having difficulty breathing… and before my hat flew off. Oh, and a word of advice- it took a lot of effort to retrieve this hat after I lost it the first time; if anything you do causes me to lose it for good, then I am going to weave another one out of your scalp."

"Bit possessive, are we?"

"Shut up and pay attention to the ground."

"Look, we know where we're going now, don't we? Governor, don't you agree that that's a good-"

Rasp groaned loudly, and put his head very firmly between his knees. "Unless you really want to become intimately acquainted with my breakfast," he mumbled, "_please_ shut up and pay attention to the ground."

"FEELING A BIT AIRSICK AGAIN, ARE WE?" bellowed Woolwax, who was sitting on the opposite carpet. Thankfully, voices weren't considered "ambient noise" by whoever had first crafted the Sound Limiter spell, so the thuggish Munchkin could be heard reasonably well enough.

"NO," Rasp howled sarcastically. "I'VE JUST DISCOVERED THAT THE BIRDS WE ATE WERE DISEASED. WE'VE ALL GOT SEVEN MINUTES TO LIVE!"

"VERY FUNNY."

"JUST BECAUSE _YOUR_ STOMACH DOESN'T TRY AND KILL YOU EVERYTIME _YOUR_ PILOT DOES A BARREL ROLL DOESN'T… doesn't… d… d…" Rasp fell silent for a moment; then, without warning, he leaned forward and vomited noisily over the right side of the carpet. There was a yelp of disgust from the rest of the crew, and Elphaba winced sympathetically, privately glad that she'd chosen to fly on the left side.

"Oh _Oz,"_ Rasp gurgled at long last, wiping his mouth of the back of his hand. "This is the part about flying nobody ever mentions: the Wizard, Glinda, you- nobody who's ever succeeded in flying ever says anything about spending the whole trip puking your guts over the side and hoping you won't fall to your death." He gave Elphaba a look of pure jealousy. "You just don't suffer from airsickness, do you?"

"Don't talk," Elphaba advised. "Just close your eyes and pretend you're somewhere else."

"I'd like to, but it's a little hard to do that when I'm sitting on a carpet a few hundred feet in the air with the wind in my ears and face, being given advice by an ex-terrorist witch while the failed entrepreneur at the controls of this wretched thing tries to get us killed in the most spectacular ways imaginable."

"Who are you calling "failed"?"

"_Don't look at __**me!"**_Rasp shrieked hysterically. _"Look in front of your or below you or whatever the hell you're supposed to be looking at!"_

"Governor, we are flying on a completely horizontal course: even if I do let go of these corners, it'll take us a good few minutes to hit the ground."

"As opposed to the _upwardly vertical_ course you were setting a minute or two ago, in which we would never have seen the ground again?"

"Oh for Oz's sake, I'm never going to hear the end of this from you, am I?"

Elphaba smirked. "I could hear people on this carpet screaming from about fifty feet away, Brollan," she said, cheekily. "So, no, I don't think any of them are going to let you hear the end of it."

"Would it help if I explained? The only reason why I started going up in the first place is because this animal- Curving Horns or Swirling Antlers or Bent Tuning Fork or whatever the hell its name is- jabbed me with its horns."

The Gazelle took a very deep breath. "My name," he said loudly, "Is Javelin."

"You have my sympathies. Now, as I was saying, if you want to blame anyone for my upward course, blame the goat."

"First of all," said Elphaba, with an air of forced calm, "He's a gazelle, not a goat. Secondly, the only reason why you ended up with Jav's horns in your back-"

"Oh, you're on _nickname_ terms with it now," Brollan sneered. "Wonderful. Does it call you "Mistress?" Or "Grand Witch?" "Destroyer of Oz?" Oh, here's one I can just imagine it saying- "Elphie." How about that… _Elphie?_"

"Don't call me that," said Elphaba quietly. "Only my friends call me that."

"Friends?" echoed Brollan. "Is that what you call them? See, I've heard the stories about you and your "friends," and I'd just like to know if you're talking about the kind you kidnapped off the streets in the middle of the night, or the kind who accepted money up front and were never seen again? Because, and let's be frank here, those are the only people who would willingly associate with you outside of a crisis situation."

There was a pause, and then Elphaba, who was almost incandescent with rage, reached out and grabbed Brollan by the collar, forcing his head over the side of the carpet until he was in danger of falling off altogether. "Listen very carefully" she snarled. "If I hear one more Anti-Animal remark drop from your purulent lips, then you are going to spend the last few minutes of your life trying to learn how to fly without wings. And, unless you honestly want to end up breathing through your _**EYESOCKETS**__,_ then you'll never even joke about what you _think_ my friends are. Clear?"

"Absolutely crystal."

"Good. Now get back to flying."

She almost threw Brollan back into position. Then, she took a deep breath, and turned to the rest of the crew, who were all staring at her in paralysed terror. "Sorry," she sighed. "I just get a little bit touchy about these sorts of things."

"That's perfectly alright," squeaked Rasp, for once too terrified to be airsick. "But I think you might want to explain that to Woolwax." He pointed behind her, and Elphaba turned to see that almost everyone on the other carpet was pointing their launchers at her, just waiting for Woolwax to give the order.

"IT'S OKAY!" she said quickly. "JUST A MINOR DISAGREEMENT."

"REALLY? THEN I HATE TO SEE MAJOR DISAGREEMENTS, WITCH. IS SHE ANY DANGER, ACTING-GOVERNOR?"

"NOT AT THE MOMENT, WOOLWAX. NOW, PLEASE STAND DOWN, I DON'T WANT TO DIE." As the opposite team slowly disarmed, Rasp sighed deeply. "Alright you two," he said wearily, "This can't carry on the way it's been going; I know I can't expect you to just start agreeing with each other- you, but we just came within inches of being blown to pieces by our own bombardiers. Can the two of you at least agree to leave each other alone- and stick to the agreement this time, _please?"_

The two of them grumbled noncommittally.

"I don't suppose it'd be too much trouble to shake hands?"

"Piss off, Acting Governor," snapped Brollan, not even bothering to look up from the controls.

Rasp massaged the bridge of his nose in exasperation. "You'd think near-death experiences would make you people work better as a team, but no. I mean, just how many brushes with death can you take before you either start cooperating with each other or die?"

There was an ominous rumble from below, and a massive fireball shot past the carpet, badly singing the tassels of its right side and neatly removing Rasp's eyebrows.

"…_Evasive manoeuvres!" _he shouted.

To his credit, Brollan didn't feel the need to ask questions at that point; he simply put his head down, tweaked a corner of the carpet, and sent the whole thing speeding off towards the Deadly Desert as fast as its enchanted acceleration could carry it; on the other carpet, Moleburr was plotting a similar course at much the same pace. Elphaba followed, angling her broom slightly downwards, hoping to get a good look at what was attacking them; unfortunately, whoever or whatever had launched the fireball had done so from beneath the dense canopy.

With no way of getting a closer look without becoming a target, Elphaba put on an extra burst of speed and hurried after the fleeing refugees.

However, less than two hundred feet from them, she saw both carpets stop so fast that several of the passengers were almost jolted over the side; then, both reversed course and started drifting rapidly towards the source of the fireball. Elphaba didn't have to focus on the currents of magic dragging the carpets through the air to see that Brollan and Moleburr were no longer in control of either one; in fact, Brollan was engaged in a heated argument with Javelin, attempting to debate the point that Javelin should do the selfless thing and jump off the carpet to lighten the load, Gnoll was trying vainly to separate them, and Rasp was being sick again. Apparently, the sudden jolt hadn't helped his stomach much.

"What the hell is going on?" he shouted, once he'd recovered.

"A very potent spell, by the looks of things," Elphaba called back. "Obviously you're being drawn back to the source, and there's nothing much I can do about it until we actually see who's casting it."

"Oh," grunted Rasp, trying valiantly to help Gnoll shove Brollan back to his end of the carpet, "I suppose it's time we finally use our bombardiers, then. WOOLWAX! READY THE-"

A loud, piercing burst of laughter neatly sheared through the end of Rasp's order and silenced the arguing refugees; Elphaba swore she could actually see birds tumbling out of the sky as the laugh echoed towards the horizon, growing louder and louder as it went. And then, as the carpets finally shuddered to a halt, the refugees at long last caught a glimpse their attacker, but quite frankly, it would have been hard for them not to notice it under the circumstances:

The creature was levitating, rising up through the trees below until it was at least ten feet above the canopy. As if that wasn't enough, its body only made it even more distinctive: it seemed little more than an emaciated tangle of malformed limbs, broken only by thick chunks of stone embedded it its ghastly white flesh. As it hovered eerily towards them, Elphaba realised that this creature had no less than seven arms, most of which were busy keeping its spindly legs in the foetal position that the rest of it occupied; the remaining three, once again dotted with fragments of rock, now swarmed with magical energies.

Then, it turned to face them, and from the bird's nest of emaciated arms, a face emerged: bald, deathly pale, and bleeding foul-smelling ichor from a dozen rents in the flesh, it was not a pretty sight. Startlingly, the head was at least partially composed of stone, but the thing was so caked with blood and other discharges that it was hard to tell where the granite ended and the flesh began. The eyes, though, were…

For a moment, the refugees sat paralysed under the magician's hypnotic gaze.

Then it opened its stone jaws and let out a deafening peal of maniacal laughter, and everything seemed to happen at once: Elphaba discerned just about everyone aboard the two carpets frantically scrambling for the weapons they'd dropped, and then another fireball roaring out of the monster's warped fingers- just before her instincts kicked in. There was a brilliant flash of vivid green light, as Elphaba's first attack sent the thing shooting backwards across the canopy.

Snarling and giggling at the same time, the magician-monster spun around and hovered back towards her, preparing a magical counterattack of its own: an assortment of ethereal knife-blades tore at Elphaba from all sides, slashing at her exposed face and hands, trying to dislodge her from the broomstick. Hissing in pain as one of the invisible knives cut deep into her forehead, Elphaba hammered at the creature's frail limbs with all the kinetic magic she could muster, and was immediately rewarded by a loud _CRACK_ of breaking bones.

Somehow managing to scream in pain and laugh uproariously at the same time, the creature readied another spell… and not too far away, Woolwax's voice boomed, "OPEN FIRE!"

In between the explosions of magic and gunpowder against the magician-monster's flesh, the sparks of rockets bouncing off its deflective shielding, the sprays of blood, and the occasional shout of "bang!" from the bewildered bombardiers, Elphaba heard a voice ring out- the voice of the creature:

"OXEN!"

Elphaba was preparing another spell and wondering why the thing was screaming about Oxen, when she realised that she was suddenly hovering in shadow, as were the other two flying carpets, the monster, and a good deal of the forest behind it. Her heart sinking, she turned around, expecting the worst.

As expected, the newest arrival towered over them and a good deal of the forest; even though the details of its face and body were hard to discern with its back to the sun, Elphaba could clearly see that it's flesh was once again a bizarre hybrid of flesh and stone, with lengths of humanoid tissues weaving clumsily into lumps of rough grey rock. And all of this disturbing mixture of the organic and inorganic had somehow resulted in a creature that looked more like a small and extremely angry mountain than anything else, except of course for the solid stone arms that looked uncomfortably like overbuilt columns.

The behemoth glared down at her, opened a set of mantrap-like jaws that could have chewed through a concrete bunker without having to swallow, and _roared._ Once the noise had subsided and all the birds in the area had departed, Elphaba uncovered her ears and turned around to find that the refugees had taken advantage of the first monster's distraction and flown away as fast as they could without even bothering to wait. Sighing irritably, Elphaba turned back to see that the two monsters were closing in on her, each one carefully cutting off her escape routes- the multi-limbed magician gathering the energies of its next spell in its bloodied hands, the behemoth tearing a whole tree out of the ground to use as a club.

_This_, she thought_, is going to hurt. A lot._

* * *

"I'm telling you, we have to turn around, _now!"_

All eyes aboard the two carpets- which were now flying side by side as the pilots made their own vague attempts at coordinating strategy- turned sharply in Curter's direction.

"And why's that, exactly?" Brollan retorted. "In case you've forgotten, that's the Wicked Witch of the West that's back there- you know, the maniac who terrorized Oz for years on end, tried to start a smear campaign against _the Wizard-_ of all people-, then died, _returned from the dead_, probably played a part in the Nome invasion, and now intermittently explodes whenever you say anything remotely negative about animals. Remember that?"

"Can't imagine _why_ she'd explode, with what you've been saying," Javelin muttered sarcastically.

"I know that," said Curter, ignoring the gazelle, "but we can't just leave her there!"

"Why not?"

Curter opened his mouth to answer, and found that he had absolutely nothing to say that Brollan could possibly accept as a legitimate reason for returning, at least if he was being perfectly honest. No, this would require a certain degree of improvisation and guile; this would require all the persuasiveness and suavity he didn't have; this would mean having to lie convincingly. So, what eventually emerged was, "Because you just _can't!"_

"It's because you're trying to redeem her, isn't it?"

"First of all, so what if I am? Secondly, it's nice to know that my alchemy crew gossip more than the average knitting circle."

Nervous laughter rippled through the cluster of refugees behind them, but Curter could also hear the derision in their voices; he had already lost the argument. But then, was it really so surprising that nobody on either carpet would be willing to turn back and risk death in saving the life of the Witch?

No, but that didn't make the truth any less bitter, especially when he knew that not far behind them, Elphaba Thropp was about to be thrashed to death with a tree trunk. And there was absolutely nothing he could do about it but watch as her only chance at redemption died with her- along with any chance of discovering how and why she'd returned to life in the first place.

It couldn't end like this, could it?

Surely the Unnamed God couldn't be this anticlimactic.

And then, Rasp cleared his throat: "Turn this thing around," he said.

"What?"

Rasp took a deep breath, swallowed hard, and said in as clear a voice as he could manage through the approaching bout of airsickness, "We need to turn back _now."_

"Not this again," Brollan muttered wearily. "Acting Governor, I still don't know exactly why the two of you have gotten along so well until now, but this isn't the time to start pushing your friendship on the rest of us: in case you haven't noticed, we aren't exactly equipped to face up to whatever's back there right now-"

"Then we might as well just give up the whole idea of trying to fight the Nomes right now, shouldn't we? We've only got so many shells to use against them and no way of making more, and now that we've left behind the only person who might be able to destroy Nomes without using explosives, we might as well be totally unprepared."

"Hold on- we've got enough shells to sink a ship at this point! The last time I counted, we had hundreds of them- don't ask me how we managed to even get them onto this carpet, either. So why are we worrying?"

"Because they won't last forever; it's a simple as that."

"So, we put our trust with the Witch just because you've got cold feet over a supply issue? Great plan,_ Acting Governor;_ you're really showing the responsibility your constituents have come to expect. I'm sure all the other secretaries in the former Governor's office dreamed that they could lead a small army on a suicide mission to earn brownie points with the Wicked Witch of the West-"

"Ladies and gentlemen!" Rasp said loudly. "Mr Brollan is attempting to imply that I am unfit for the duties of _Governor,_ and that I am about to lead this force on a mission that will result in certain death for us all. Now, we can resolve this the democratic way: if you believe that the course of action I'm about to take is unwise, and that Miss Thropp's magical powers are of no use to us, then I will step down and let the Mr Brollan- obviously the more experienced leader- take my place. Would those in favour say aye?"

Silence followed.

"And would those in favour of my leadership continuing say aye?"

There was a loud chorus of ayes from the refugees, Curter and Gnoll being the loudest.

"Right then," said Rasp, smiling grimly. "Mr Brollan, would you be so kind as to turn this carpet around? We have a secret weapon to rescue!"

Curter stifled a laugh, and began readying his launcher. As he did, he heard Brollan muttering, "What is wrong with these people? Have they all forgotten that bitch's reign of terror? Does it really take one speech from that pop-eyed little turd to make her one of the family?"

"Of course not," said Javelin. "They're only agreeing with him because he suggested that you'd have to replace him if he was wrong."

"So? Is that such a bad thing?"

Javelin chuckled. "Brollan, you're a Gillikin businessman among Munchkin farmers; plus, you came here proposing _industrial development_. That makes you about as welcome as a cold-sore in a kissing competition."

"Oh, thanks a lot. _Moleburr! Let's get going before I lose any more of my faith in human nature!"_

Slowly, the two carpets separated, turned, and began speeding back towards the battling figures on the horizon.

* * *

Normally, Elphaba reflected, as she ducked under the behemoth's oncoming fist, this would have been a lot easier if this giant had been her only opponent; though the thing moved a lot faster than its massive body suggested, it still would have had a lot of trouble killing anything soaring fifty feet above it. However, with the multilimbed monstrosity hovering after her, flinging bolts of lightning in her direction, Elphaba was hard-pressed to evade the two of them and fight them off at the same time- in fact, she was so caught up in dodging the swings of the behemoth's club and the magical blasts that she was barely able to concentrate on what spells she was going to use next.

And what the hell were these creatures anyway? They were only _partially_ composed of stone, so they couldn't be Nomes; in fact, the sheer amount of deformity and disparity pretty much ruled out most of the species that Elphaba knew of. And where had they come from in the first place?

Swerving violently to avoid the next magical attack flung at her (a writhing mass of energies that looked uncannily like a cloud of grasping hands reaching out to grab her) Elphaba returned fire with one of the most unpleasant spells in her repertoire: softly chanting an incantation, she gathered a sphere of lethal toxins and corrosives in her hands, and flung it at the magician's face.

There was a splash as the ball of chemicals struck home, followed by a loud hiss, and the monstrosity let out a deafening scream; Elphaba risked a quick glance behind her and saw that the giggling monster had stopped flying after her and had tumbled out of the air, too focussed on clawing at its mangled face to levitate in any direction but downwards. _The only problem,_ Elphaba thought, as the creature plummeted towards the canopy, _is that the fall might not be fatal and the poisons might not kill the creature immediately, but they might at least debilitate it long enough for me to get rid of the thing…_

No sooner had the thought entered her mind when the falling monster unleashed a salvo of fireballs; Elphaba was already getting ready to duck out of the way when she realised that they weren't aimed at her…

* * *

"Pull up! Pull up!" Rasp shouted desperately.

"Why? You want us to plot a course so we can fire on that big bastard on the right, don't you?"

"Brollan, have you looked a little to the right and down a bit lately?"

There was a short pause as Brollan looked in the indicated direction and saw the hail of fireballs roaring towards them. "… oh, _shit!"_ he yelped. "Stand by for emergency spiralling!"

"No, no, you don't need to manoeuvre like that!" Rasp yelled. "You don't need to spiral; you just need to turn hard to the left! Are you listening to me? I said, _you don't need to_ OH FFF-"

* * *

Elphaba, who had stopped in mid-air some distance away, would have checked to see exactly what the monstrosity had been aiming at, but she was occupied with more immediate concerns; for example, the fact that the behemoth had given up on trying to hit her with its tree-trunk club and simply flung it at her.

This time, though, Elphaba had enough time to react: one spell later, the club had been reduced to a cloud of flying woodchips.

_Well, that was easier than I thought it would be. Maybe the-_

Another tree trunk shot past her, and Elphaba looked up to see the behemoth reaching deep into the canopy with its massive arms, tearing entire trees out of the ground and flinging them at her at a phenomenal rate; in fact, they flew at her so quickly that Elphaba had to actually dodge _and_ destroy the incoming trees, before deciding that life as a stationary target wasn't worth the effort; she took off with all the speed she could manage from a mid-air start, peppering the behemoth with magic, but unlike the magician, this creature's body was almost completely composed of rock, with only the face and some external tissues being fleshy enough to injure.

She tried to alternate her attacks in ways that should have been lethal, pummelling the body with spells that could tear through rock like cheap plaster and bombarding its face with anything that would hurt- fire, ice, poison, anything that would kill it, or at least weaken it enough for the killing blow. But not only was the behemoth clever enough to shield its face with its arms, but its stone body actively resisted the thunderous blasts of magic that should have chiselled it to pieces.

_On the upside,_ Elphaba thought, as another tree roared past her, _If I keep this battle up much longer, none of the refugees will have to worry about getting lost in the future; at the rate that this thing's tearing trees out of the ground, they'll have an ideal landmark to watch for. Of course, it'll have probably killed me as well, so they'll be happy regardless of what happens…_

She was halfway through ducking under the next attack, when something large and distinctly carpet-shaped sped past her, trailing screamed expletives, closely followed another one, each one circling the creature as the refugees aboard them readied their launchers.

The behemoth saw the two carpets as well, and turned- just in time for the familiar shout of "OPEN FIRE!" to ring out across the treetops; bellowing in pain, the monster lurched backwards as Curter's homemade rockets slammed into its upper body, scarcely managing to protect its face from the bombardment. Then, from behind its stony limbs, its expression went from pain to fury: Elphaba didn't even have the chance to call "look out," before it clambered to its feet, knelt down like a sprinter at the starting blocks, and _charged._

What followed was probably the loudest noise Elphaba had heard in her entire life, as the enraged monster thundered across the forest at a speed matched only by derailing trains, its thousand-ton bulk shattering trees into matchsticks and tearing carriage-sized divots of earth out of the ground as it went; at the last hundred feet or so, the refugees finally gave up on trying to bring the charging beast down with their explosive, and took off in separate directions at such a speed that quite a few of them were almost thrown from their carpets altogether.

What with the forward momentum it had built up, the behemoth took a while to actually stop, and it did so with a jolt which virtually disintegrated a massive chunk of the forest in front of it. Then, it turned once more, readying to charge again.

Elphaba could see that none of the refugees were prepared this time around, least of all the pilots: Moleburr was struggling to climb back onto the carpet, and Brollan looked as though he'd hit his head on something. And with everybody else alternately trying to retrieve their weapons or help each other back onto the carpets, they were left completely defenceless before the approaching behemoth.

Searching her memories for anything which might have an effect on the creature- which was still picking up speed- Elphaba suddenly realised that she had the perfect weapon right beneath her: the trees, or more specifically, their roots. So, hoping and praying that she had enough power to get this done without having to resort to her notebook of spells, she focussed all her attention on the ground below her and concentrated.

Yes, there magic here- leftovers from the spell which had created this country-spanning forest in the first place. Pouring her own magical power into the soil, Elphaba coaxed the roots of the trees to grow again, this time in new shapes and sizes that _she_ dictated; then, she took command, directing the mushrooming plants to stretch out beyond the soil with long, tentacle-like roots, towards the behemoth… where they began to constrict.

The first one to reach the oncoming monster shot around its leg like a bullwhip, almost tripping it up; the root itself was almost torn from the ground by the sheer force of the behemoth halting, but that scarcely mattered: now that it was standing still again, it was an easier target. More roots emerged from the ground, the thickest of them wrapping itself tightly around the giant's waist; it tried to wrestle the creeper off, but another two wound around its arms, dragging them apart- and leaving its face defenceless.

For few seconds, there was silence except for the creature's snarls of frustration as it tried to escape its bonds; then, one of the roots snapped, and every single refugee aboard the two carpets were scrabbling for their weapons, even those still attempting to climb back on board. With Elphaba occupied with trying to strangle the behemoth to death, the refugees in various states of injury and/or unconsciousness, and almost no loaded weapons within for those that weren't, there was only one of them capable of launching the killing blow.

Rasp.

Even from this far away, Elphaba could clearly see the look of terror on the Acting-Governor's face; she'd seen that expression far too many times in her days as the Wicked Witch of the West, usually attached to guardsmen who'd just realised that the rest of their unit was miles away and that they'd been left to fend off the Dreaded Witch by themselves. But at least they'd had some training- Rasp had only the few minutes he'd spent watching the bombardiers practice, and it was very probable he didn't have any practice at aiming at anything other than an office wastebasket.

For what felt like a century, he stood there, silently mouthing the words "Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit, I'm going to die," until the behemoth looked up from its restraints and saw the tiny figure on the edge of the flying carpet, with another rocket launcher shouldered and ready to fire.

It roared its defiance.

And Rasp, being Rasp, flinched- and instinctively pulled the trigger.

There was a very damp explosion, a spray of blood and gravel, and the behemoth's freshly-decapitated corpse gently toppled backwards, snapping almost every single one of Elphaba's restraining creepers as it descended, finally landing on its back with a colossal thud that would have no doubt registered on a seismograph.

What with the refugees being alternatively breathless, deafened, unconscious, or just paralysed with shock, it took some time for people to finally react; it took Elphaba arriving alongside the two carpets to finally galvanise them into some semblance of action. Rasp, however, remained standing at the edge of the carpet, soaked to the skin with blood and shaking like the proverbial leaf in a gale-force wind, his eyes wide and fixed on a distant point on the horizon.

"Rasp?" Elphaba whispered. "Are you alright?"

"Not really," whimpered Rasp. "But then, I'm not really here, you see: I'm in bed, fast asleep and waiting for the alarm so I can live another boring day as a secretary; I'll have lots to do this morning, a lot of paperwork to sign and plenty of letters to deliver to the press and the governor said that we'd be expecting some dignitaries from Gillikin country, so I'll be sure to wear my one really nice suit and play it nice and professional until five PM and then I'll go out and get drunk with my friends. And that'll be the most likely thing to happen to me because Oz only knows I'm not really here, standing on a carpet hovering a few hundred feet in the air, holding a rocket launcher with my only really nice suit that I wore for the visiting dignitaries splattered with a monster's blood and brains and argh argh arghggghg…"

He threw up; once he had stopped gagging and retching, he lay on the carpet, shivering and oblivious to the stares of the other refugees.

"Do we have any wine in our supply bags?" Elphaba asked, eventually. "I think he might be in need of a stiff drink."

"That can wait!" said Rasp, staggering to his feet. "First, we go down and take a look at the corpse and try to figure out what it was… or at least, that's how these kind of dreams usually go, don't they? D-don't they?" His eyes bulged, and he almost toppled over again. "That's how it goes, doesn't it?" he repeated.

"Brollan, you heard the man; first the autopsy, then booze."

* * *

In the last few days, any curiosity from the refugees had been dampened by their own fear; the proposed-but-abandoned search for food and equipment in the ruins of the villages they'd passed, the exploration of the abandoned manor, even the most basic queries into Elphaba's background- all of them had been curtailed by their own nervousness. But now that they actually had a triumph of their own to celebrate, spirits were refreshingly high and morbid curiosity was free to flourish: as soon as they landed, the refugees began studying the body of the fallen behemoth with reckless enthusiasm, scaling its mountainous knees to examine the flesh of its torso at close range.

For once, they were in too good a mood to be annoyed when Elphaba joined them to perform her own investigations, quietly surveying the corpse with diagnostic spells. Rasp, meanwhile, was propped up in one of the craters that pockmarked the body, very slowly drinking from a flask of whiskey and gradually beginning to look a bit less comatose. "What the hell is this thing, anyway?" he said. "I thought this was some Nome general that got left behind when the forest sprung up, but you can clearly see that it's got flesh-"

"As well as stone," finished Elphaba. "I know. And it's definitely not a case of magical prostheses either; this isn't someone's attempt to replace lost organs or limbs with stone replicas. In fact, as far as I can tell, it looks more like a botched attempt at a transformation."

Curter grimaced. "Like the petrifaction? _This_ is what happens when that goes wrong?"

"Not really; in fact, it looks more like the exact opposite of petrifaction- someone's tried to turn rock into flesh and bone. And judging by the amount of deformation," she added, wincing at the vestigial eyes staring blindly from the corpse's left armpit, "I'd say it wasn't successful."

"So this thing really _was_ a Nome?"

"Once, yes." Elphaba waved an explorative hand over one of the shallower wounds in the corpse, and frowned. "This wasn't made by us," she said quietly. "This is a much older wound… and it's also badly infected. Well, at least we have a decent clue as to why this thing went crazy, but it still doesn't explain why this thing was so resilient."

"What do you mean?" Woolwax grunted. "All it took was one shot to the face to bring this thing down; I wouldn't call that resilient."

"Oh come on, the sheer amount of rockets and magic we threw at this thing should have smashed it to pieces long before Rasp blew its head off; even a Nome as big as this one shouldn't have been able to remain intact. No, there's something different about this one, something… something… just under the skin…" Reaching out with an index finger suddenly glowing with magical energies, Elphaba traced a straight line for at least six feet across the creature's mottled skin; there was a pause, and then a long incision appeared, oozing syrupy black blood. Concentrating, Elphaba tore into the wound she'd made, magically peeling back the tissues to reveal the source of the gargantuan Nome's endurance.

There, around its stony waistline, was an interlocking row of solid metal plates, each one carved with a series of arcane symbols. "Well, well, well," purred Elphaba. "Ladies and gentlemen, we are very much in luck! What we have here is a magical belt of protection, probably custom-made for this Nome; it looks as though it was cemented onto the body, and when the transformation started, the new skin must have just grown _over_ it."

"So how is this a good thing?" Rasp asked. "I mean, wouldn't that mean that the Nomes have more of these technically impenetrable defence belts?"

"Not necessarily: belts as powerful as these take decades to build and enchant, especially with the amount of customisation this one had to go through, so I doubt very much they'd have a stockpile of these things. But the good news is that we now have a way of defending the carpets from magical attacks; these plates can be separated and still retain their enchantments, so-"

"We just have to tie one of these to each carpet. I understand. There's just one question, though… has anyone found the body of the other Nome yet?"

There was a pause, as the refugees considered this; Elphaba swore that she could actually feel their happiness evaporating as the logical implications occurred to them. A ripple of panic spread through the crowd; in less than a minute, almost all of the refugees were audibly worrying that, at any minute, the nine-limbed Nome sorcerer would suddenly appear above them and incinerate them all with a single spell. It wasn't until a few people (Gnoll among them) began to mutter about not wanting the last sound they ever heard to be "that bloody giggling" that Elphaba felt the need to step in. "At the risk of putting a damper on this promising atmosphere of fear and paranoia," she said wearily, "In case you forgot, I _did_ hit it in the face with a solid ball of corrosives and poison. _And_ it fell at least a hundred feet."

"But it can fly," Curter pointed out. "And nobody actually saw it hit the ground."

"Ah. Good point. Carry on worrying."

Eventually, one of the refugees drew a pair of binoculars from his backpack (after admitting that he'd "borrowed" them from the mansion), and spent the next few minutes scanning the edge of the forest for any sign of the Nome magician. The others hastily armed themselves once again; in fact, the only one among them who wasn't readying some kind of a weapon was Elphaba.

She couldn't stop thinking about the behemoth they were standing on; if this creature really had been a Nome, then who or what had transformed it? If "what," was there a naturally-occurring magical phenomenon somewhere in the world that could actually induce random transformation in living beings? And, if "who," why the hell would anyone want to transform a Nome- an earth elemental with a body taken from the nearest source of rock, according to Madam Morrible- into…

What?

A human?

Well, obviously a badly-botched version of a human, considering that the end result had been somewhere close to a hundred and thirty feet high, ridiculously deformed, probably half-insane, and saddled with a flotilla of infections that would have probably killed it anyway if Rasp hadn't done it first... but yes, this might just be a possible explanation. But why? Why would anyone want to try and turn a Nome into a human being?

Elphaba massaged her temples, and added this latest question to the long list of unsolved mysteries she was cultivating. On the other hand, if the Nome magician was still alive, it might be able to actually answer this one, assuming, of course, that it didn't kill them all first-

"Governor! Look!"

Rasp took the offered binoculars and peered into them, focussing them on a point on the other side of the clearing that the enraged behemoth had created. "I see it," he said softly. "It looks as though it's leaning against a tree. It might be dead, as well… but I can't be sure. Maybe it's playing dead." He thought for a moment. "Curter, do you think you could hit the thing from here?"

"Probably not, in all honesty: even if I did have a scope on my launcher, there's still the problems of distance that the rocket would have to travel to reach the target, plus the difficulties of wind interference and the fact that this weapon is an artillery piece and not a sniper rifle. I'd just waste ammunition if I tried."

"Okay then…" Rasp's brow furrowed with concentration, and he quietly chewed on one of his fingernails. "Elphaba, can you-"

"On my way," said Elphaba, clambering back onto her broomstick. "And get ready to run if this turns out to be some kind of ambush," she called over her shoulder as she sped off towards the distant trees.

Seconds later, she dismounted less than a couple of feet from what was undeniably the corpse of the Nome Magician; having survived Elphaba's magical poisons and the fall to earth, the multi-limbed monstrosity had met a very timely end when one of the trees that its oversized friend had thrown at Elphaba had landed on top of it. Judging by the blood trail, it had remained conscious long enough to haul itself a little ways through the forest, rested against a tree for a while, and then died.

However, as she surveyed the scene, Elphaba noticed something in the distance, almost lost among the trees: it was a small stone hut, half-crushed by the growth of the forest, but somehow still standing for all the abuse that had been heaped on it. Had the magician been trying to find some kind of shelter in his final minutes?

Signalling the refugees to follow, she slowly approached the hut, alert for any signs of movement from within. Long before she reached the front door, though, she could already smell the distinctive odours of blood, vomit, and decaying flesh. She took a minute to steady herself, and to wait for Rasp and the others to catch up with her; there was something about this place that actively stifled the desire to enter alone, more than just the smell of death and disease shrouding it. Perhaps it was the strange, rasping sounds she could hear from within; maybe it was the way the barest branches of the trees around it seemed to reach towards the door like jealous, grasping hands; or maybe, it was just the fact that the door was left ever-so-slightly ajar…

As a child, Elphaba hadn't had too many encounters with real terror after her third birthday. After all, it was hard to believe in the bogeyman when most of the servants around the house acted as though _she _was the bogeyman; the fact that she'd had much sharper teeth in her earliest years didn't help. With mother dead and father holding his eldest daughter in contempt, Elphaba had learned to banish her fear of the dark with anger, and gradually forgot it altogether. Since then, she'd felt fear and anxiety countless times, yes… but one thing she'd never felt since those days was pure, unmitigated terror at _what could not be seen._

For a whole minute, she stood there, waiting for the others to arrive and trying not to think about the shadows that lurked and slithered behind that door, all the while failing miserably; her imagination was already painting a very vivid picture of the squamous tentacles and the glittering compound eyes in the darkness. _It's just a house!_ She told herself. _It's just a tiny stone house that might just have a dead body or two in it; it's not as if we weren't expecting to find something like that. And even if it is, you have __**magic**__, remember?_

And somewhere deep inside her, a poisonous little voice sneered, _So what? It's not as if your magic could ever really save you in a crisis. It couldn't save Fiyero, not without turning him into a crippled, badly-stitched freak; how do you suppose it'll save you?_

Somewhere behind her, a twig snapped, and Elphaba spun around, her hands crackling with magic and ready to incinerate any squamous creature from the abyssal depths… and found herself trying to fend off a startled and evidently non-squamous group of Munchkins, two Gillikins, and a Gazelle.

"Don't _do_ that!" she yelled, quickly dispelling the energies.

"Don't do what? You wanted us over here, didn't you?" said Rasp.

"Well, I did but…" She took a deep breath. "As you can see, I found the magician, he's dead, and he was trying to crawl in here."

Rasp opened his mouth, likely about to ask either why the magician would be heading in this direction, or why Elphaba was so jumpy; then, his face froze- he'd noticed the smell. And judging by the expressions of horror and disgust on the faces of the other refugees, they'd noticed it too.

From somewhere in the crowd, Gnoll mumbled, "Do we really have to go in there?"

"I don't see why," said Brollan. "I mean, now that we know that the other Nome's dead, we don't have to be here, so let's go."

"I never thought I'd ever agree with this Gillikinese twit," said Woolwax, "but the asshole has a point- we don't have to be here, and there's nothing stopping us from leaving."

"Mmmp," Rasp concurred.

"Is anyone else feeling a distinct sensation of crushing dread?" said Elphaba conversationally.

For once, no stares resulted from this comment, as most of the refugees were too unnerved to take their eyes off the front door of the house; they could only nod helplessly. Rasp, meanwhile, managed to find his voice again: "D… do you think that there's magic involved?"

"Fourteen heavily-armed adults all feeling the exact same emotion about a single open doorway? It's sounding very likely. Maybe it's a spell to keep unwanted visitors out." _Question is,_ she thought, _why resort to inducing fear when you could just make the house invisible, place a magical barrier around it- or better yet, just barricade the door? And another good question: which of us will manage to resist the spell enough to enter?_

The seconds dragged by, as the refugees tried again and again to approach the door, all of them sweating and hyperventilating as they tried to force their bodies to move against the current of their own terror, and all of them failed. One or two of them actually collapsed, whimpering in horror as the magically-induced fear temporarily overwhelmed them. Even Elphaba found it difficult to move under the sheer pressure of the spell.

And then Javelin trotted forward; he, too, was affected by the spell, but obviously not as much as the others, and certainly not enough to keep him away from the door. Perhaps the spell had only been designed to effect humans; who could know? In any event, he made it as far as the doorstep, and nudged the door open with his horns; over the sound of hinges creaking in protest, Elphaba felt the sheer power of the spell suddenly lessen and fade into a steady background level of anxiety- the same kind of anxiety any adult would feel about walking into a dark room with the smell of rot about it.

"Urgh," muttered Javelin, who now had an unhindered view of whatever lay behind the door. "You might want to take a deep breath before following, governor, because… well, it's not pretty…"

Elphaba and Rasp were the first to enter the house, propelled by a twisted mixture of curiosity and the desire to uphold their reputations; the others followed hesitantly, some barely managing to enter the house at all- if only because the house was simply too small to allow too many people inside…

… Especially since the house was still inhabited.

The… _inhabitants_ lay slumped against the walls and heaped upon the floors, their bodies contorted with pain. Elphaba didn't need to conjure a light to see that every single one of them was a transformed Nome, and that all of them were dying- if not already dead.

No wonder the magically inclined among them hadn't been able to create a more powerful defence- none of them had the energy to do so.

If the deformities on the behemoth and the magician were grotesque, the ones on these Nomes were downright horrific: some of them simply hadn't been able to develop a proper skeleton, and now lay in sagging heaps of rock and boneless flesh. More evident were the ones who _had_ developed a spinal column, only to have it snap under the weight of stone shoulders.

Others were little more than disordered balls of limbs, eyeballs, and blindly gnashing mouths, probably unable to walk, let alone survive without assistance. But even the ones who'd manage to survive the transformation without being openly disfigured were in no better condition: much like the behemoth, all of them were rife with infections and old wounds. One or two had simply suffocated to death, their newfound lungs being too weak to support their bodies.

As Elphaba passed the rows of bodies, some stirred, and tried to reach out to her; whether they were trying to attack or beseeching her for help, she couldn't tell. She could only slip out of their grasp, and try not to think about what they might be feeling at the moment. Behind her, Rasp shuddered in horror, and a few of the others following him yelped loudly as similar grabs were made at them.

Then, from the ranks of the dying, another hand shot out and seized Elphaba's; this time, the hand was made of solid marble and gripping too tight for her to escape. And because most of the refugees were too overcome with shock and not overly concerned over what might happen if the Nome went for her throat, there were no screams- allowing her to hear the choked whispers that followed.

"You… you... are still free," gasped the Nome.

"Am I?" Elphaba asked, trying vainly to pry the Nome's fingers off her hand. "I certainly don't feel it."

"It was… believed… that you would be… captive by now… he must be furious."

"What are you talking about? More to the point, who are you?"

The Nome laughed hoarsely, and barely managed to hold off a coughing fit. "Once… Lord Eldrect… Noble of the Nome Dominions… now… nothing…" He paused. "One request… Miss Thropp."

"How do you know my name?"

"In time… you shall learn how. But please… some of us will take hours to die… please… cleanse us…"

"What?"

"Burn us. Free our souls with fire."

There was an appropriately deathly silence, and Rasp asked, "Is he asking for-?"

"Of course," said Elphaba, her voice hard. "They're already dying; they want a quicker death."

"More than that," said Eldrect. "We want purification… we want our sickness to die with us… and reclaim our place in the earth… in eternal slumber…"

He fell silent, lapsing into hoarse, laboured breathing. But Elphaba could still see the Nome's mangled face, and the pleading look in his eyes. As much as she might hate the Nomes, this wasn't a fate she'd wish on anyone- not even the Wizard himself.

She sighed deeply. "Governor," she said quietly. "Get your people out of here."

"You mean you're actually going to-"

"Just get them out of here so I can put these Nomes out of their misery."

The moment Rasp had escorted the other refugees out of the room, Elphaba turned back to the crowd of dying Nomes, held up a handful of conjured flame and…

…Purified them.

None of them screamed. In fact, she was certain that she heard a few sighs of relief as the fires consumed them. And suddenly, for the blink of an eye, she was back in the Wizard's palace, finding Doctor Dillamond cowering at the back of the Flying Monkeys' cage; she remembered the sorrow and rage she'd felt at seeing the state of unintelligence he'd been reduced to, and wondered- not for the first time- if it would have been more merciful to simply kill him than to leave him with his debased half-life.

Would he have asked for a quick death, if he had the opportunity to do so?

As the fires continued across the room, immolating half-lives as they went, Elphaba realised she was blinking away tears. She hastily wiped them away, and turned to leave before the fire reached her; but as her gaze drifted idly across the tiny room, it alighted on a corner that had previously been thick with shadows. There, the figure of a Nome was now visible- not one of the tortured hybrids, but a true, stone-bodied Nome.

A spy.


	19. Unwelcome Truths

A/N: Here we go, ladies and gents! The latest chapter- featuring confrontations, arguments, an awful lot of unwelcome truths for the characters, and an F-Bomb. I thank you all for your reviews so far, and I hope you enjoy this installment! Read and enjoy!

Feel free to review and make your opinions known! Do you like how the story's progressing so far? The Twist at the end of this chapter? By all means, review!

Disclaimer: I don't own Wicked, as I'm sure everybody knows well enough.

* * *

Basalt's search for the "abominations" had been long and halting; having little experience with Oz's geography beyond the maps that he'd committed to memory, and with only the vague coordinate of "Northern Munchkinland" to follow, it had taken him hours to locate the dumping ground that Scathelex had spoken of.

In the end, he'd arrived there by chance, only recognising the half-forested crater as what he'd been searching for when he discovered the first of the bodies on the southern embankment, entangled in the roots of a tree.

Even though it's physiology now seemed closer in appearance to that of a human, even though it was currently in a steadily advancing state of organic decomposition, the corpse clearly belonged to that of a Nome spy.

As he tried to process this sight, Basalt noted somewhat abstractly that Lord Scathelex's decision to title the creatures he'd seen as "Abominations" might well have been appropriate, if all of them were similar hybrids of Nome stone and human flesh.

But who could have done this?

And why?

Not too far from it, another body lay in a crumpled heap: as far as Basalt could tell, it had once been a soldier, and much of the distinguishing points of its physique had been lost in the transformation and decay it had undergone. However, this corpse lay at the start of a long trail of debris leading far off into the distance; at first, it consisted of yet more bodies, consumed by the growth of the forest, but as Basalt followed the trail to a small, they were replaced on the opposite bank by the fallen limbs of trees. It definitely belonged to that of the Abominations, for the branches and strips of bark were slowly joined by oddly human bloodstains and discarded chunks of the Nomes' own former bodies.

Eventually, the trail ended at a small stone house several miles south of the dumping ground. Unexpectedly, the house was defended, partly through a spell that evidently was not designed to effect Nomes, but mostly through the efforts of two guards: one of them was far too mutilated for Basalt to discern the former Nome's ranking, but the other was immediately recognisable as a Siege Weaponry Specialist- known among the emotionally privileged as "Siege Breakers," or "Anger Engines," both for good reason. Uncertain of the reception he'd receive from the two, Basalt carefully slipped back into the earth, and approached the house from below.

Thankfully, the house's foundations were unguarded, and there were no floorboards between the rest of the building and the soil, so Basalt was free to emerge from the ground and into the house. Immediately, he found himself surrounded on all sides by row after row of…

Basalt didn't feel like calling them abominations; in spite of the obvious hybridisation of the inorganic and the organic, the name felt deeply inappropriate somehow.

Nonetheless, he rose from the piles of flesh and rock without complaining of the bodies he had to push aside in order to move, though he did his best to treat the dead and the dying with suitable reverence; these had once been Nomes, after all.

Slowly, he surveyed the room, examining the hybrids and committing every single mutation and distortion to his memory for future perusal, all the while wondering who or what could have done this to so many innocent Nomes. Did the King have something to do with this? Had he known of its occurrence? Had he cast whatever spell had started the transformation? Basalt's mind rebelled at the very thought of his master doing such a thing, but all the same, he couldn't quite drive the idea out of his brain altogether. So he focussed on the grotesquery around him, and continued basic documentation. Then, just as he was beginning to wonder if anyone among the dying was capable of answering questions should he ask them, there was a loud grunt of anger from just outside the door.

Risking a quick look outdoors, Basalt saw that something had caught the guards' attention, and they were now zeroing in on three miniscule shapes far overhead. It might have been Basalt's new imagination confusing his senses, but for a split second, he thought he felt a wave of powerful magic emanating from one of the distant figures; then, it was gone, as if it had never existed at all.

Whatever they were and whatever capabilities they possessed, all three of them responded by quickly fleeing- up until the smaller of the two guards magically dragged them back towards it, and began pelting them with energies. Just as the Siege Breaker was joining the fray, a voice from behind Basalt whispered, "A Nome Protector… here?"

Basalt slowly turned to find himself face to face with…

Somewhere in his mind, the words "one of the dying" suddenly vanished, and were promptly replaced with "a noble" and he instinctively bowed.

"My Lord, I-"

The Nobleman shook, apparently laughing and coughing all at once. "…No need to stand on ceremony, Protector… I have no rank to speak of anymore... I have only my name- Eldrect. But what brings you to… Muchkinland, young Protector?"

"I have been assigned a task by his Majesty the King; a test of personal development and-"

Eldrect smiled knowingly. "You wished to know of his plans, and he refused to make it easy for you. I am familiar with his Majesty's intricate games… and I imagine that he is now playing an even grander one with far bigger stakes at hand… toying with the lives of so many- human and Nome alike-"

Suddenly, Eldrect began to cough again, his body shaking as he tried to control the vagaries of his new respiratory system. For five whole minutes, he wheezed, gasped for air, and eventually began coughing up blood, clawing furiously at his malformed throat as he did, actually drawing blood in his vain attempts to clear his oesophagus. Basalt tried to help him, but this presented its own difficulties, as Eldrect's transformation had rendered him extremely fragile, and Basalt's stone hands had very little tactile sense. All he could really do was hold the former Noble's arms away from his flesh as gently as possible, and try to prevent any further injuries.

And all the while, the sounds of battle continued to drift through the open door, the loudest of them being the sound of the Siege Breaker's footfalls.

When the fit had subsided, Eldrect spluttered helplessly for at least a minute, before continuing. "I might not be able to justify what the king has done… there are limits to even my oratorical skills… and besides, I haven't the breath. But I… can… explain what he did to us… what he plans to do with our people… with the Nome Dominions... with Oz… with all of reality…"

He took a deep breath. From somewhere outside, a voice bellowed "OPEN FIRE!"

Barely raising his voice over the distant explosions, Eldrect continued, "Go to the library- the protected volumes chamber… the librarian will grant you entry if you claim that you are acting on orders from the King. The book… I can't tell you the title, because the King periodically disguises it with an illusion… he… he wants to cover his tracks until the end, you see… but I can give you the location…"

Very slowly, the disfigured ex-Lord recited a long shelf code; once he had finished, he ordered Basalt to repeat it at least twice before he was decided that the code was well and truly memorized. For a time, he lay there, staring at nothing in particular; as the silence dragged on, Basalt tried to imagine what the King might have done to these Nomes. Even though every fibre of his being and every moment of personal experience still prevented him from thinking too deeply on the subject, he couldn't stop thinking about it altogether.

What eventually shook Basalt out of his reverie was a massive seismic tremor, powerful enough to almost fling him off his feet. He later learned that this had been produced by the Siege-Breaker's corpse impacting the ground, but the time, the only realisation he came to was that Eldrect hadn't said anything for several minutes. "My lord," he whispered, "What should I do once I have located the book?"

"Well, read it, obviously. If you're in a hurry, the first, second-last and last chapters are the most relevant to the situation."

"I understand that, my lord, but… what am I to do after that?" He wasn't asking for orders; many lower-ranking Nomes had a habit of asking higher ranking Nomes (or at least, the ones they were permitted to speak to) for advice.

Eldrect smiled, his mouth a ruin of blood, broken teeth and stone. "Quite simply, you draw whatever conclusions you feel you must from it, as any Nome with the Privilege of Initiative would. As for what you do next… well… that's up to you, isn't it? Now go; you're a very busy Nome, I'm sure, and you can't afford to waste time talking to forgotten nobodies."

Basalt wasn't sure how he should respond to this beyond thanking Eldrect for his help.

But then again, the entire situation was beyond anything he'd been prepared for in training or experience. First among the many confusions that now queued for his attention, there was the distinct sense of uneasiness and apprehension he felt around the bodies of the mutated Nomes, which made no sense to him; on occasion, he'd been asked to dispose of corpses as part of his cleaning duties, and whether the body had been human, Nome, or animal, he'd never once felt any real hesitation at handling bodily remains. Secondly, he was still trying to come to terms with the fact that the King could somehow be involved in whatever had happened. Thirdly, Basalt had never, in his entire life, heard a Noble denigrate himself to the level of "nobody"; even Nobles who'd ended up with next to no authority of their own would not think so little of themselves. After all, having ascended through the ranks, they were possessed of almost every single Privilege that a Nome could attain; how could they possibly be called "nobody?"

Basalt wondered what had happened to Eldrect to influence his opinions in this direction- or even what it would be like to _be_ Eldrect at that moment. There were limits to Basalt's imagination, but even with them in place, such a life didn't seem enviable; given that the trail that had led him to this house in the first place had been made aboveground, it seemed very probable that these Nomes might no longer be able to travel through the earth or even alter their bodies on the most basic level; certainly, they didn't seem able to take new bodies at all. These traits had been present in their species since before they _were_ Nomes, and had become as integral to them as working limbs were to a human.

Even Basalt couldn't fail to recognise the fact that what had been done to these Nomes was…

…Inappropriate?

…Unnecessary?

…_Wrong?_

Deciding to discard these troubling thoughts for the moment, he decided it would be best to just leave; he was about to depart through the floor in much the same way that he'd arrived, when he suddenly felt another pulse of magic very similar to the one he'd felt when the guards had started chasing after the airborne intruders, but this one was much closer… and getting steadily closer.

Though Basalt had no skill in magic as of yet, the ability to sense it had been present since his formation, just as it was in all other Nomes- a basic supernatural talent common to the entire species. Now that he'd had some experience with witches like Glinda and Mombi, he knew that, as generally non-magical creatures, humans only presented a discernable amount of magic when they were using their powers, unlike Nomes. But while the entity that was approaching the house seemed human to a certain extent, the sheer quantity of magic contained within it seemed to overshadow the amounts he'd seen in most _Nobles._

At that moment, he should have left; he should have acknowledged that a potential threat was approaching, and departed as quickly as possible so he could get back to the business of following the lead he'd been provided with. But Basalt's curiosity had been piqued; it _might_ be worthwhile to stay and learn more about this magician, if only for the sake of his studies. So, he hurried into the back of the house and squeezed himself into one of the corners, where the shadows would conceal him from human sight.

After a short delay, presumably caused by the few remaining defences set up around the area, a small crowd of humans entered; clearly, these were native Ozians, rendered itinerant following the invasion and reforesting. It didn't take much effort to determine which of them was the magician Basalt had detected, for she stood at the front of the group. Because the room's only source of light was behind her, Basalt couldn't see her face; in fact, the only thing about her that he could see of her- apart from the magic- was her black dress and pointed hat.

As he watched, the woman and her companions investigated the room in much the same way he had, barring fits of nausea, of course. Then, without warning, Eldrect suddenly reached out and grabbed the woman's hand.

The conversation that followed made no sense in the context that Basalt viewed it, the remark about how the woman had been expected to be "captive by now" least of all; judging by the questions she asked, the woman evidently found it just as confusing. However, what caught Basalt's attention was how Eldrect referred to her as "Miss Thropp."

He'd heard that before, but…

"Burn us," said Eldrect, interrupting Basalt's thoughts. "Free our souls with fire."

The humans appeared to consider this for a time. Eventually, one of them- a diminutive Munchkin in a bloodstained suit- muttered, "Is he asking for-"

"Of course," said Miss Thropp. "They're already dying; they want a quicker death."

"More than that… we want purification," Eldrect whispered. "We want our sickness to die with us… and reclaim our place in the earth… in eternal slumber…"

Basalt barely had time to wonder if the humans would show mercy to Nomes after all that had been done to Oz, before Miss Thropp began ordering her companions out of the room. Then, with a wave of her hand, she granted Eldrect's request: fire rippled from her fingertips, washing over the ranks of the dead and the dying alike, swiftly burning away every trace of flesh from their abused bodies and leaving behind only stone. Unfortunately, Basalt was unable to appreciate this, because his senses had almost overloaded at the sheer power that the woman had just utilised; incredibly, the power had been active for less than a second or two, but it had temporarily blinded his thaumaturgical vision- in much the same way that bright sunlight would dazzle a human after hours in the dark.

He'd predicted that he would experience such a thing in his journey, but he'd expected this to happen when he returned to the Nome Dominions, where the glare cast upon his senses by the Nobles would have made him shy away in discomfort... whilst the incandescence of the King would have blinded him just as Miss Thropp did.

Equally unfortunately, he was so occupied with trying to regain his equilibrium that it took him a moment to realise that the room was now on fire. Though the heat posed no danger to him, his hiding place was now _very_ visible.

And Miss Thropp was staring directly at him.

Basalt was halfway through diving back into the earth when his magical senses flared again, and a tendril of magic curled around his body before he could abandon it altogether, dragging him back out of the ground; but he didn't stop there: with a single gesture from Miss Thropp, he found himself suddenly soaring gently over the rows of burning corpses, leisurely crashing through the doorframe, and finally tumbling headfirst into the dirt just outside. Once again, before he could escape into the earth, he felt Miss Thropp's magic descend on him, yanking him bodily upright and suspending him just a few feet above the ground- imprisoned in thin air.

After a while, his senses adjusted to the sudden touch of magic, and he found that he could see without disorientation. Looking around him, he realised that he was now surrounded by humans; each of them was armed with a strange, tube-shaped weapon, and all of them bore expressions of obvious anger.

"Where the hell did this come from?" one of them demanded.

"I found him cowering in the back of the room," Miss Thropp replied, sounding almost as angry as the other humans looked. "He was probably spying on us."

"Really?" snapped another. "Then maybe he'll be happy to answer a few questions, won't he? Turn him towards me, Witch." Very slowly, Basalt felt himself rotating in midair until he was facing the speaker- a tall Gillikin male with matted blonde hair. "Now, you listen to me," said the man. "See that dead body over there? The really massive one you could call a mountain if you could stand it upright?" He pointed at a point several hundred feet behind him, where the corpse of the Siege Breaker lay. "We killed that," the man continued. "We blew its face off. Now, you're nowhere near as big or as tough as that thing, so unless you want to end up as the gravel in someone's driveway, I suggest you answer anything we ask you- starting _now._ You get me?"

Basalt nodded.

"Good. My first question… my first question is…" The man thought for a moment. "Damn it, what was I going to say?"

Somewhere to his left, Miss Thropp laughed. "No offence, Brollan, but maybe this should be handled by people with brains larger than a grape." Once again, Basalt felt himself being rotated in a different direction, until he found himself face to face with Miss Thropp for the first time. "First of all," she said icily, "Why were you spying on us?"

Basalt was about to answer, when his eyes finally focused on the figure of the woman in front of him: under the wide brim of her hat, her face was emerald green in colouration; her long-fingered hands were of the same colour, so it might be safe to presume that her entire skin was, in fact, green. Very slowly, he began comparing her to Glinda's description- just in case he really had beaten the astronomical odds of meeting a similar human woman with green skin. But no, every single feature matched; the dark hair, the piercing eyes, the distinct lack of scars around them, the sharp facial features- even the clothing was identical.

Elphaba Thropp.

The Wicked Witch of the West.

One of the most feared individuals in Oz's history.

And now, undoubtedly one of the most powerful magicians that Basalt had ever encountered.

Awe was an emotion that even the lowliest Nomes were equipped with, but Basalt never thought that he'd ever feel in awe of a human.

Unfortunately, according to the accounts of Glinda, the Scarecrow and the King, this particular human had been dead for over a year. So, either she had somehow managed to return from death, or she had never died in the first place.

The latter appeared very likely: after all, the vulnerability had never been publically demonstrated until the day of her death, and there were no facial scars to indicate the kind of wounds her tears would logically cause, so perhaps the whole thing had been just a very clever ploy by Elphaba to confuse her enemies- and to allow herself an escape route if the need arose.

"Well?" she said. "Answer me!"

Something in Elphaba's tone silenced Basalt's thoughts and pierced his self-control; perhaps it was some brand of vocal magic, maybe he was still disoriented by his brush with sensory overload. Whatever the case, before he could stop himself, he found himself saying, "I was not spying. I did not know you were here."

"Oh really? Then why were you skulking in that corner then?"

"I was following the trail of the… altered Nomes. I did not expect to encounter any practitioners of magic in the area, and…" He trailed off.

"And you got curious when I approached?" Elphaba finished.

He nodded.

"Convenient," grumbled one of the Munchkins. "How, exactly, are we supposed to know if it's lying or not?""

"More importantly, why are we even questioning it the first place?" said another.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, if it's been sent all the way out here on its own, I doubt it's been told anything earth-shattering."

"I know, but you heard what it said- it wasn't expecting to meet anyone who had enough magic to stop it; I mean, maybe it's a messenger."

"Delivering messages to houseful of corpses?" Elphaba snorted. "I doubt that very much."

As the argument carried on, Basalt knew that he couldn't afford to stay here any longer, especially since, even if they weren't planning revenge against him for the invasion, they would probably kill him anyway to ensure that he didn't report their location to the King. However, as long as Elphaba had control of his restraints, he wouldn't be able to escape. Of course, breaking free might not be as hard as it seemed; from what he knew of magic, quite a few spells and techniques relied on the practitioner maintaining at least a certain degree of concentration.

But what would break that concentration?

For the moment, the humans were engaged in something of a dispute over what they might ask him; a few of them wanted to know why the Nomes had invaded, some wanted to know if they could ransom him back to his superiors for political favours, and several just wanted to kill him and be done with it. Elphaba meanwhile, stood to one side and looked somewhat exasperated.

_Perhaps I should try for spontaneity. _

"Miss Elphaba!" he called suddenly.

Elphaba blinked, and Basalt was rewarded with a sudden dip in height before the witch's concentration returned. Shoving a few of the disputants aside, she marched up to him, her expression revealing "distrust" and "irritation."

"That's the second time today that a Nome's used my name," she said. "How exactly do you know it, and more importantly, what the hell do you- or your superiors- want with me? And don't try and play dumb; Eldrect told me that someone was expecting me to be captive by now, and I know that Mombi was setting me up for a trap in the Nome Dominions, so what does your King want with me?"

Basalt thought quickly. Could he lie convincingly to a human? Lying to a fellow Nome was one thing, but deceiving a human, specifically one who didn't know that certain Nomes were forbidden to lie, was a different matter entirely. Also, Glinda _had_ told him that Elphaba was easily provoked to anger, a trait that might become lethal to him should he irritate her further. Perhaps it would be better to calm her down before carrying on with the distraction. But what could he say? What could put Elphaba at ease- if only to stop her from killing him?

Perhaps- inspiration at last! - he could claim to be a representative of Glinda as well; if nothing else, it might assuage Elphaba's distrust.

"My superiors are not the only ones who would have business with you. There is another in the Nome Dominions who I speak for, one who would be much happier for your presence there."

"Is that right?" she said. "Don't keep me in suspense; who is it?"

"Her name is Glinda, and she misses you terribly."

There was a sharp intake of breath from the crowd of humans; Basalt once again wobbled in mid-air as the witch's concentration briefly faltered. After a few moments of silence, she began to speak, and Basalt quickly realised that he'd made a very serious error.

"Why… _exactly…_ would she tell you that- or anything for that matter?" Elphaba hissed, her voice shaking. "What exactly did you do to make her admit that? What else did you make her confess? I really, _really_ hope you have a good excuse for me, because if I actually get to the Nome Dominions and find that she's been harmed in any way, or if she's been tortured for information or if- gods help you- she's died in captivity, _then I am going to tear you to pieces! I don't care if your stone skin can't feel pain! I will find a way of __**making**__ you feel pain! I don't care if it takes me the rest of my life- I will find some way of subjecting you to as much pain as you put her through!"_

And Basalt could tell that this was different from the threats that Mombi had made during her fits of rage; this sounded more like a promise than anything else.

Suddenly, Basalt's feet were within reach of the ground: dipping one foot into the soil, he poured his spirit back into the safety of the earth, leaving his old body to collapse into rubble behind him. As he hurried off to the north, cursing his limited knowledge of human behaviour all the way, he heard Elphaba screaming: "_Oh, that's right, run away, you cowardly bastard! RUN TO THE ENDS OF THE __**FUCKING EARTH**__!"_

* * *

Elphaba stood very still, glaring at the spot where the Nome had once hovered. She took a deep breath, and tried not to think on what her fears had just conjured up, but nothing could blot out the image that now occupied her imagination: Glinda's corpse, slumped in the torture chair, her hair turned crimson with blood. Elphaba took an even deeper breath, and said quietly, "We're leaving."

"What?" Rasp demanded incredulously. "No! No, we are not- not until you explain that little outburst."

"What's there to explain?"

"Actually, I think there's an awful lot," snarled Woolwax. "Since when do you care about Glinda? You actually told us that you were never friends or allies- do you remember that?"

Brollan laughed. "Something tells me that it's time for a very awkward confession," he chuckled, rubbing his hands.

"Oh, _shut up!"_ Elphaba and Woolwax roared in unison.

There was a long and awkward silence, and Elphaba realised that everybody in the group- Munckin, Gilikin, Animal, pro-Glinda, Anti-Glinda, or purely neutral- all of them were looking to her for an explanation. "Alright," she said wearily. "I lied. I don't think that's much of a shock to anyone here."

"Could you be a little bit specific?" said Rasp. "What exactly have you lied about when it comes to your relationship with Glinda?"

"Would it help if I just told you the whole story?"

"It might."

"Okay, okay…" Elphaba took yet another deep breath to steady herself; this would _not_ be easy. But then, just a few days ago, she'd said that she'd happily give up all her secrets if it would save Fiyero and Glinda. So, it was with a certain degree of acceptance that she took a seat on the forest floor, and readied herself for the worst. "Those of you who actually want to hear this might want to take a seat," she said. "This is going to be a long and boring story."

"I wouldn't know about that," said Brollan with a smirk. "Hearing the scandalous tale of the Wicked Witch of the West's university days? Something tells me I should have brought popcorn."

Elphaba rolled her eyes, and began her story in earnest:

"We met on the first day of the semester; it wasn't hard for us to notice each other, considering we were probably the two most noticeable students attending Shiz at the time. She was the undeclared queen of the students, while I was the outcast. She was rich, spoiled rotten by her parents, and set up as the only student attending magical tuition; I was mainly there to look after my sister. Then, things went a bit awry for both of us; first of all, when I heard that Nessarose was to be taken out of my care, I lost composure and… well, I'd been showing signs of magical power for some years before that, but nobody except father and Nessa had seen them. This time, everyone in the room saw my powers flare… and this time, I was rewarded for it: the headmistress removed Glinda from magic classes and gave the position to me. Add to that the fact that Glinda had to share a room with me, and we had one of the worst possible starts to a relationship ever.

"We hated each other in those first few months; we'd fling insults, we'd call names, we'd play pranks- the usual symptoms of a school rivalry. You don't need to know specifics, because it really did go on for ages. But the one thing that changed everything, the thing which actually made us into friends was _this_…"

She took off her hat, and showed it to the crowd: it had aged decently enough, considering the amount of wear and tear it had been exposed to over the years. Since it had come into her possession, it had been burnt, cut, bludgeoned, trampled, soaked, but still it remained intact; it had even survived the few instances of Elphaba retrieving it with a teleportation spell. "This, she said, "Was a gift from Glinda. It wasn't meant to be that at the time, you see; she'd got it from some embarrassing relative and naturally wouldn't have been caught dead with it, so she gave it to me as part of yet another idiotic prank. But this one was different; she felt remorse for it. She apologised for it, in her own way. And, of course, we couldn't really be rivals anymore after that, especially after I got her enrolled in the magic course."

Her smile slowly faded. "And then, just a few short weeks later, our history teacher was arrested."

Rasp, who'd been taking a drink of water, almost choked. "That was an awkward segue," he muttered. "What was he arrested for?"

"What do you think?" said Javelin quietly. "Those were the years when Animals lost the right to hold jobs- and the years where several of them lost their powers of speech. And those that kept speaking out were arrested… or vanished. You'd hear stories of Animals deciding to walk home by themselves one evening and never being heard from again; or of friends and family finding the homes of their loved ones abandoned and emptied, as though nobody had ever lived there at all."

There were immediate grumbles of discontent from the refugees who'd professed to Anti-Animal leanings, and Brollan muttered, "Not this again. How many times do we have to refute this shit-"

"Forever."

"Look, I don't know where you claim to get your evidence from, Gazelle, but there's no proof that the Wizard's government was involved in anything as clandestine as that, or even that it happened in the first place-"

"I don't claim anything, Mr Brollan," Javelin whispered icily. "When you've had to cope with the disappearance of friends and family, when you've had to spend the night awake, terrified that you'd be next, we can talk about proof. For every year of the Wizard's rule, I was terrified that I'd end up dead, or incapable of thought. Every time I had to leave the house, I thought someone would be waiting to slip a collar around my neck; every time I went to sleep, I worried that I'd wake up in a cage. So whenever you get nostalgic about "the good old days" when humans didn't have to share personal space with Animals, just try and see it from my perspective- if you dare."

The Gazelle took a deep, shuddering breath, and turned back to Elphaba. "Your history teacher was Doctor Dillamond, wasn't he?"

"You knew him?" said Elphaba, scarcely able to disguise her amazement.

"Not personally. You see, a few months ago, Glinda unveiled a memorial to all the Animals who were killed or brainwashed during those years: at the top of all the names carved into the stone, there's Doctor Dillamond, Goat, Teacher of History at Shiz University."

Elphaba smiled sadly. "That wasn't the first time Glinda memorialized him; you see, before her university days, her name was actually _Galinda_, but Doctor Dillamond could never quite say it- he'd always stutter on the G and call her Glinda instead. So, when it turned out that he was never coming back from prison, she changed her name to Glinda in his honour."

(Elphaba didn't have the heart to tell them that this had mainly been to impress Fiyero, so she carried on with her story.)

"In any event, I was worried about what was happening to the Animals of Oz, and M-"

"I get it," Brollan interrupted. "This is where you claim that you carried out your long reign of terror all for the sake of the talking beasts."

"Do you want to hear this story or not? As I was saying, Madame Morrible had been suggesting that I should be presented to the Wizard as a candidate for the position of Grand Vizier. So, I thought it would be a brilliant opportunity to alert him to the injustices that the Animals of Oz were suffering, so that something might actually be done about it. When the Wizard finally requested an audience with me, I went to the Emerald City with a massive speech prepared on the subject, and Glinda tagging along. We were friends by that stage… and neither of us were prepared for what we found."

"And what was that?"

"Only what I told the rest of Oz during my "reign of terror": that the Wizard was a fraud and responsible for the atrocities being committed on the Animal Populace."

There was an angry grumble of dismissal from the refugees, punctuated by a few cries of "Do you actually expect us to believe that?"

"Not really," said Elphaba. "Nobody in all of Oz believed me; why should you? But my point is, that was when I became the Wicked Witch of the West… and when Glinda joined the Wizard." She sighed. "We parted amicably as we could…"

"_I hope you're happy, now that you're choosing this."_

"_You too."_

She bit her lip; there was still a little way to go in this sordid little retelling, and she couldn't give in just yet. "When we met again, she was Glinda the Good; sometimes we met in public, sometimes in private… but by the end, we were both unhappy."

"From having to publically oppose each other?" Rasp asked.

Elphaba offered a rueful smile. "That was _one _reason, yes. The other was that… we were in love with the same man."

Once the shocked gasps had died down, Rasp managed to choke out, "You mean Fiyero Tiggular? Glinda's fiancé? He was in love with you?"

"Of course."

"Then… was _that_ why he disappeared?"

"No; he disappeared because he helped me escape from a squad of guardsmen. I doubt even the Wizard himself could put a good spin on "Glinda's ex-fiancé declared traitor and accomplice to Wicked Witch, summarily tortured for information." After my botched attempt to save Fiyero's life, everything fell apart: my sister was dead, all my plans and contingencies had failed, my friendship with Glinda had very nearly collapsed, and as far as I knew, Fiyero was dead. And by that stage, the Witch-Hunters were marching on Kiamo Ko with Dorothy's companions rallying them… and all I had left was the time to say goodbye to Glinda.

"I told her not to mention anything of our friendship to anyone else, or to try and clear my name; I knew that she'd be rejected if that happened. But, from what you've told me, she couldn't help but admit at least part of the truth." She sighed wearily. "If any of you wondered why she gave the speech you mentioned, why she told the rest of Oz how hard my life had been… well, now you know. We were friends."

There was dead silence.

Eventually, Curter, who was all but glowing with amazement, said, "You returned from the grave to save her from the Nomes?"

In spite of herself, Elphaba smiled. "It certainly seems that way, doesn't it."

She let her gaze sweep across the refugees, all of whom appeared to be still recovering from the shock: Rasp appeared to be mulling over what he'd just heard; Curter was still amazed; Javelin was ashen-faced from his outburst; Woolwax looked as though he didn't know what to think of the story; Gnoll's jaw was hanging open; and Brollan looked just as cynical and doubting as ever.

"Is that why you got so angry when I made that joke about your friends?" he asked. "Because I'd insinuated that Glinda was a p-"

"You're on thin ice, Brollan," growled Woolwax. "You just watch what you say about Glinda, or there'll be nobody to hear you scream when that ice breaks."

"I don't see why _you're_ still so protective of her good name, especially since you've just been told that she was a traitor to the Wizard-"

"That's enough, Brollan," said Moleburr.

Elphaba blinked in surprise: beyond the odd whispered conversation with Brollan, this was the most she'd ever heard the tight-lipped Gillikin say.

But Brollan was not to be deterred: "Do not contest me on this one, my friend; "traitor" is the only word I can use to describe Glinda at this point: I mean, let's see, she maintains a friendship with a known terrorist even after achieving high office in the Wizard's government. She holds _private_ meetings with the Witch, whilst giving away Oz only knows how much confidential information to the enemy in the process… oh, and when the bitch up and dies, what does Glinda "The Good" do? She decides to undermine everything the Wizard created by allowing the Animals rights, presumably carrying on her dear dead friend's work! If that can't qualify as a traitor to the Wizard and to the people of Oz, then I-"

"I said, _that's enough."_

Minutes passed in silence; nobody seemed to know what to do or say next, and anyway, most of them were beginning to look a bit too disheartened for it. Elphaba honestly couldn't tell if it was a result of the story she'd told or Brollan's attempt to highlight Glinda's "treachery", but either way, the unhappiness was almost tangible; by the time the third minute had passed, Elphaba half expected to find a miniature raincloud hovering over them when she looked up.

Of course, the refugees weren't alone in their depression: Elphaba herself was feeling gloomy, and not just from the history she'd just retold; she still hadn't recovered from the encounter with the Nome hybrids, and the run-in with the spy that had followed. She shouldn't have gotten so carried away in the case of the latter; she should have clamped down on the frustration as soon as she felt it, and carried on interrogating the spy. But she'd honestly been too shocked to stop herself from jumping to conclusions.

_Maybe the spy hadn't learned about me by torturing Glinda; maybe he really was her representative… or maybe he was just trying to make me lose concentration. What does it matter? The bastard's gone, and he's probably reporting our location to the Nome King even as we sit and mope._

"I don't see why we can even believe what she says anyway," grumbled Brollan quietly. "She admitted that she lied about Glinda back at the manor-"

"Brollan, if I ever lie to you, chances are you'll recognise it if you pay attention to one very noticeable fact."

"And what's that?"

"People tend to believe them very readily," said Elphaba with a smirk.

Brollan groaned. "Oh, so you remembered that we believed you when you lied about Glinda. Very, very, _very_ funny. Basically, this is another attempt to say that every single lie you told in your reign of terror was actually the truth."'

"No, I'm saying that most Ozians find it very easy to accept lies as truth."

"Did… did you just say what I think you just said? Not only do conduct a reign of terror that causes Oz only knows how many deaths and injuries, not only do you tell the most spectacular lies about the Wizard and about his policies toward Animals, but you call _us_ gullible for seeing your propaganda for what it is?"

"Javelin, do you want to give a little more evidence for this twit's benefit? I'm out of ideas."

"You're on your own, Elphaba."

"See? Even the goat doesn't want to support you-"

"For the five hundredth and seventy-fifth time, _I AM NOT A GOAT-"_

"Could you three kindly break it up?" snapped Rasp. "We're all very upset, and starting a fight is not going to help anyone."

Brollan's face, already scarlet with rage, turned very ugly. "What is the matter with you, exactly? Were you this unpatriotic and cowardly when you were a secretary, or did that only happen when you started spending time with the Witch? This woman is calling the people of Oz gullible! _Where is your national pride?_ Why have you not confronted her over this?" He threw up his hands in disgust. "More the point, why am I even talking to you? I already know I'm not going to get anywhere!"

"It's nice to know you've reached the same conclusions I have," said Rasp quietly, as the argument skidded on without him.

"Alright then, Witch," Brollan continued. "Let's hear your evidence: if you think that we're gullible, if you think we can accept lies easily enough, prove it! We believed you when you told us about Glinda, fair enough; name _one_ other instance where you managed to lie convincingly to us- and by that, I mean all of us, and not just the governor. And," he said, leaning in just a little too close to Elphaba for comfort, "it has to have been told by _you, _and not something you ordered that two-faced little bitch to s-AAAH!"

As Brollan staggered backwards, the right side of his face blistering lividly, Elphaba finally spoke. "You want to know of a time when I managed to deceive you?" she said, barely managing to keep the rage from her voice; she'd wanted to keep this particular secret hidden for the moment, if only because the refugees hadn't had enough time to recover from the last shock, but Brollan's endless complaining had once again managed to shorten her temper to vanishing point. In that moment, she didn't care about the consequences; all she wanted was to wipe that pompous smile off Brollan's face with a bit of evidence that even he couldn't deny.

"You want to know of a lie I told that you accepted?" she continued, her voice thick with venom. "Fine. I've managed to fool not only you, but the entire population of Oz. And you know what? You've all believed the lie I told for an entire year, and none of you even questioned whether it might have been true. Why? Because it was adapted from a bit of gossip that you'd already accepted as the truth, even though there wasn't the slightest bit of evidence to support it: "I hear that the Witch's soul is so unclean, pure water can melt her!" Ring any bells?"

There was a horrified gasp from the refugees.

"You mean… water _couldn't_ melt you?" whispered Gnoll in disbelief. "It never could?"

"Of course not! I was surprised that anyone in all of Oz was stupid enough to believe it; I mean, if I was vulnerable to water, what exactly do you think my tears were made of? Syrup? Whiskey? Hydrochloric acid? What exactly would have stopped my eyeballs from dissolving if water could melt me?"

"But people saw you melt at Kiamo Ko!" yelled Woolwax. "Dozens of people saw it happen!"

"And you didn't think it was strange that out of the many dozens of souvenir-hunters present, none of them tried to collect a vial of my liquefied flesh? All I did was lower myself into a trap door and leave my cloak and hat behind; once I was sure that everyone had left, I climbed out, fled for the border, and never looked back. I faked my death, and you and the rest of Oz bought it- hook, line and sinker! So, Brollan," she spat furiously, "If you want a picture of just how gullible the people of Oz can be, then look no further than the fact that you _actually thought_ that dousing a witch with a bucket of water could kill her!"

There was a terrible silence as the echoes slowly died away, only broken by the crackling of the funeral pyre, and Elphaba's heavy breathing. Eventually, Brollan asked, "Where have you been for the last year?"

"Far from Oz, trying to make a new life for myself and trying to forget how badly I'd failed."

"What do you mean "failed?" How did you-"

"Oh come on, Brollan, even you can't be that dense. I failed at what I set out to do when I first opposed the Wizard: the Animals were no better off than they had been at the start of my mission, and I was outnumbered and all but defeated. More to the point, I had to sink to the Wizard's level and commit the exact kind of fraud that he would, just so I could save my own life! I had to break Glinda's heart and convince her that I had died! But I stayed sane out there in the wilderness, and one reason for that was because I honestly believed that Glinda would be the ruler that this country deserved. She would give the Animals rights; she would treat the citizens fairly; she would rule honestly!

"Then I heard of the Nome invasion, that Glinda was captured by the Nomes, and I returned to Oz to rescue her; then," she pointed at Curter, "_you_ shot me down before I could get to the Dominions, and for the last few days, I've kept hearing of just how many people hated her: either you wanted her off the throne just because she dared to give the Animals rights, or you wanted her off the throne because she admitted to meeting me at school!"

Elphaba choked back a sob, and as she struggled for breath, she found that she was actually blinking away tears of anger. "And you know what I've realised?" she snarled furiously. "You- the citizens of Oz- didn't deserve her! She tried to give you justice and prosperity, and you threw it back in her face! I'm surprised that you didn't bow down to the Nomes the moment they set foot in Oz, and I'm even more surprised that I put up with any of you for this long! _I should have left you for dead as soon as I'd gotten the chance!_ That way, we'd all be happy: I'd have had my chance to save Glinda's life by now, and none of you would have had to listen to the truth, _because heaven knows that none of you could __**ever**__ stand to hear it!"_

She turned on her heel, and stormed off towards the clearing.

There she stood completely still for a whole thirty seconds, before she finally erupted, unleashing her rage on the land around her in a frenzy of magical energies and mad, incoherent screaming. Nothing for the next two hundred feet in front of her was spared her wrath: fire incinerated it, lightning electrocuted and denatured it, ice froze it, the winds flung it away, the very soil tried to crush it. Intense light blinded it, shadows consumed it, winds of acid dissolved it, spectral figures gathered to drown it in air. Even the very trees that Elphaba was destroying were driven to attack one another by the animating magicks she poured into them- assuming they weren't crushed by the massive divots of earth that Elphaba was telekinetically flinging in their direction.

Five minutes later, the tempest subsided, and Elphaba collapsed to the dirt; she felt no better than she had a few minutes ago- if anything, she felt even worse. Her guilt, temporarily assuaged by the confession and by the explosion of her anger, was back again, gnawing hungrily at her with fresh strength. And worse still, she'd just rendered everything she'd done in the last few days completely meaningless by throwing a temper tantrum at the refugees.

_Elphaba, why couldn't you have stayed calm for __**once,**__ instead of flying off the handle?_

"I don't know, Glinda," she said quietly. "I honestly don't know."

* * *

What with Basalt's curiosity over the mysterious book that Eldrect had told him of, coupled with the need escape Elphaba wrath, It took less than a few hours to finally arrive back at the palace, hurrying onto the floor of the entrance hall with feet that he scarcely bothered to refine as he moved as swiftly as he could towards the palace library.

He'd been there some time ago to find books on human anatomy, and though he knew his way around the towering bookshelves well enough by now, the librarian on duty still regarded him with curiosity- and suspicion. Of course, just as Eldrect had predicted, the librarian had no choice but to put his suspicions aside when he determined that Basalt was being honest when he claimed that he was on an assignment from the King; all the high-Privilege Nome could do was guide him as far as the small room that housed the Protected Volumes, warn him that his actions would be closely monitored, and return to his desk.

Inside the chamber were housed the most precious and secret books that the Nomes had written or collected in their long history as a sentient species: ancient treaties and contracts with long-forgotten peoples, essays by researchers documenting only the most earthshattering phenomena, books of powerful magical technique that ranged from spells of miraculous healing to conjurations of deathly plague, works of fiction that had been deemed too enchanted to be read safely by anyone but the librarians, and even a sandstone tablet carved with hieroglyphs that glowed ominously when anyone passed by it. All were stored in this room, housed in shelves of transparent spellglass that flowed like water, but without any of the moisture or permeability of water; like the rest of the library, the books were perfectly preserved against decay, but the Protected Volumes were also preserved against each other: any dangerous magic that the books might possess was sealed and nullified so that neither its neighbours or its readers would suffer the effects.

Even with this in mind, even knowing that he was being monitored, Basalt approached the shelves with caution; apart from the obvious danger that quite a few of these tomes posed, he didn't know what he would find at the shelf code provided.

As Eldrect had said, the book he found there was disguised with an illusion: though it was titled "The Art of Sculpting Living Matter," opening the book revealed that it was, in fact, a journal written by _the very first Nome King._ Awestruck, Basalt continued reading, and found that it was also an heirloom intended for each new Nome King to study upon their coronation, and to contribute to as they learned how to master the technique that the book detailed.

It was a well-known fact that Nomes were immortal, incapable of dying through old age or disease, but susceptible to violence or misadventure. However, this technique had been created by the first King as a means of escaping such a death: in the event that he was on the verge of dying, his essence too damaged to sustain itself, the King could project his ailing spirit into the body of another Nome, assimilating the soul of its original occupant to strengthen himself. With this revitalized spirit, he could continue his campaign against the enemies that he and the Nomes were at war with at the time.

When he finally retired, he wrote the book for his chosen heir before he left the Nome Dominions altogether, but warned that the technique it taught was only to be used in times of direst need, for it would always require the sacrifice of the closest Nome that his spirit could find. In the millennia since then, the Nome Kings had studied and researched this mysterious spell, writing their notes in the blank pages of the book; in times of war, they'd used it when they needed to, but few ever used it more than once. Then, King Roquat the Red had been crowned, and he'd carried out his reign in relative peace and prosperity, occasionally writing a few of his own notes in the book.

The next entry was dated fourteen years ago, less than a week after the death of Roquat: it detailed the circumstances of Roquat's death exactly as Basalt had been told- that during the transit of a highly unstable sphere of dimensionally-compressed magic, a rupture in its containment spells caused the whole thing to explode, killing hundreds of Nomes in the process. Among them had been Roquat, and as his chosen successors had died with him, the War Council had decided that the soldier who'd found the King's body deserved the honour of taking his place.

But according to the book, that soldier had been Roquat's new body.

The current King, the one who had conquered Oz, the one who had given Basalt his promotions and privileges, was and always had been none other than Roquat the Red.

_The Council doesn't want a King,_ Roquat had scrawled furiously, _they want a puppet- the same puppet as I was in my final years! Senile old shit that I was! So, for now, I will indulge them; I will play the naïve young King and pretend that Roquat the Red has passed into the hereafter once and for all… until I have the strength to challenge their false rule._

And the next entry was dated less than a year ago: _I have found the perfect means of overcoming the Council __**and**__ the Land of Oz. I would never have thought that these artefacts would simply fall into my hands, but how my fortunes change for the better! With these about my person, I have access to more magical power than I or any other King before me has ever possessed… but alas, their true power is sealed. They weren't meant to be used by non-humans._

_If I truly want to unlock the awesome power that they contain, then I must become a human. And our Glorious Forefather's technique might just grant me exactly that!_

Suddenly, Basalt understood.

Eldrect and his mutated retinue had not been transformed by any magical accident; they had been attempts by Roquat to create a human body for himself. One after another, he'd attempted to transform the Nobleman and his soldiers into human beings, but such an intricate transformation had been beyond even his magical powers: all of the transformed had been weak and sickly, too fail to contain the King's spirit. So, he'd kept them hidden until the invasion of Oz, when he'd had the chance to dump the half-dead bodies in a crater somewhere in the upper north of Munchkinland.

But the King had not spent the months following his failed attempt idle: he had found Glinda and the Grimmerie, both of which could grant him a much more stable transformation. And Basalt remembered- from what he had heard even while he'd tried to avert his ears from the conversation- that the King had mentioned that Glinda herself was little more than an understudy for someone far more powerful.

And the more Basalt thought about it, that someone was almost certainly Elphaba.

* * *

Basalt left the library in a daze.

He knew, now that he understood why the King wanted to become human, that he should probably report directly to the King to report his findings; and after that, he should return to his duties in protecting Glinda for as long as his services were needed.

But Basalt was still grappling with the revelation that he'd just experienced: the King, a being that Basalt had been taught to respect and obey without question, had…

His own words drifted back to him in a flood of memories: _"The King's duties do not extend to non-Nomes; he is merely to govern us, to safeguard our civilisation and culture. Everything he does is for our own good."_

But Basalt had just discovered that in the last year, the King had subjected a nobleman and his retinue to an agonisingly painful transformation that they could never recover from, all in an attempt to become a human and harness the power to- according to the notes- _control reality itself._ And as far as the notes detailed, he'd set out to seize this power partly for the sake of revenge on the War Council and Oz, but mostly to fulfil his own ambitions.

And though Basalt had tried and tried to discern a worthwhile motive among the notes- something that at least indicated that the King was doing this for the betterment of Nomekind- nothing could be found.

In the past, when a King had lost his grip on sanity, the War Council had simply instated the King's chosen heir and sent the old King off to retirement, and if no successor was available, they would govern the Dominions until they could elect a suitable replacement. But going to the War Council for help didn't appear to be an option to Basalt: even if he knew where to find them, his encounter with Scathelex and the attempt on Glinda's life had made him reluctant to trust the Generals.

Basalt leaned against the wall, trying to clear his head and make a decision, but the disorientation refused to subside.

For the first time in his life, he honestly didn't know what to do.


	20. Downtime In The Strangest Of Places

A/N: Sorry for the delay, ladies and gentlemen, but I've been swamped with work as of late. Hopefully, I can get the next chapter up a bit quicker, but in the meantime, here's the latest. I hope you enjoy it.

Disclaimer: I don't own Wicked or anything else of Oz.

* * *

The refugees spent the rest of the day huddled in the shade of the giant Nome's corpse, trying to occupy their minds with something that didn't include the revelation they'd been subjected to.

It didn't work.

Those of them who'd looked to Glinda as a saviour after the Wizard's abdication were left with the awful knowledge that much of the apparent slander her detractors had flung at her was, in fact, true. And those of them who'd gloried at the triumph of the Wizard and his champions over the Wicked Witch felt no better: they now knew that the victory had been a falsehood, and that everyone in the country had accepted it without question. Not only had this put something of a dent in their self-confidence, it had also made quite a few of them think back to the sheer relief that had gripped the country when the news of the Witch's death had reached them, the joy and prosperity that they'd revelled in, and wonder aloud, "Was it all meaningless?"

Nobody knew what to say to them, least of all the few who'd been paying close attention to Elphaba's story. It had seemed easy to dismiss it as lies and falsehoods at first, but the Witch's outburst had given it a worrying air of sincerity; before then, nobody would have imagined that she was even capable of shedding tears. For the Animal-sympathetic among them, Javelin's testimony had only added more weight to it. Of course, they still didn't believe the wild tale of the Wizard being a fraud- after all, there was only so much they were prepared to believe- but nevertheless, their beliefs had still been badly shaken.

Of course, three particularly outspoken members of the group were engaged in their own private reveries: Curter, Rasp and Brollan all sat as far away from the refugees and from each other as possible, thinking furiously to themselves- and in Brollan's case, recovering from the burn that Elphaba had given him… whilst trying to staunch the nosebleed that Woolwax had given him scant minutes afterward.

Curter was thinking of just how much of an idiot he must have seemed, insisting that Elphaba had been given such a unique chance for redemption in her return from the grave- when she'd never died at all. What a stupid thing to have said! He must have looked exactly like the stereotype he'd tried to avoid whenever he brought up his beliefs in conversation. No wonder she'd laughed at him that morning! He might as well have added a little speech on the wrongness of the Time Dragon Clock, just to drive home what a gullible, self-righteous windbag he'd seemed.

The fact that she _had_ admitted she wanted to atone for at least _some_ of what she'd done was little comfort; after all, he and anyone else with a working brain could guess at the things she wanted to atone for, and the stand she'd taken against all of Oz wasn't one of them. But then, would she even need it? Up until the temper tantrum, she'd been quite generous in assisting them, all things considered, and she was still helping them even now.

Of course, there was one other question that nagged at Curter, worse than his retrospective embarrassment: had Elphaba ever really needed to atone at all?

Rasp was trying to figure out what to do next; after all, even with his inexperience, he could still see that the group was once again close to the breaking point. Nobody knew what they were going to do, or even if they should do anything at all: a few people had actually come up to ask him if it'd be better if they just returned to the manor, or tried to find another group of refugees to ally with. And Rasp could also hear more of them whispering about stealing one of the carpets and fleeing for their lives- believing that the Witch was in charge of the group, that she was using Rasp (or "The Fucking Governor," as they called him) as a means of leading them all to certain death.

Damnit, what would the governors before him have done in his position? What would Govenor Bruxwurl have done? _Well, in all likelihood, _Rasp thought, _he would have procrastinated for two straight months, refused an invitation to the Scarecrow's coronation ceremony, and ended up getting crushed to death by a rampaging Nome._

He tried again, this time using an earlier example: what would Governor Nessarose have done?

_Am I _seriously_ asking myself that question?_

He gave up.

Meanwhile, the only thing Brollan had on his mind was one short but very important question: how was it that he'd just been punched in the face by someone three feet shorter than him?

Outside of these private reveries, the others tried to busy themselves with menial tasks: checking their weaponry, taking stock of their ammunition, reading books they'd stolen from the manor library, or preparing meals. And once again, none of them were able properly focus their attention on what they were doing- except for Elphaba, who was crouched atop the mountainous form of the dead Nome, carefully removing the enchanted belt-plates with hands that luminesced with magical power.

Those of them brave enough to look closely at her face reported that she looked quite absorbed in her work; in fact, as far as they could tell, she looked calmer than she had at any point since she'd joined them. Of course, she'd already had the chance to get the worst of her feelings out of her system- and left a large section of forest charred and smoking as a result.

But what was she thinking about, really?

What was going on behind that impassive green face?

* * *

By now, after magically chiselling away its foundations, Elphaba had finally managed to prise the first of the belt-plates loose from the behemoth's waist; now, it hovered in midair- a slab of dense metal the size of a paving stone, carved with ancient magical glyphs and shrouded with protective spells. For half a minute, she tested it, just to be sure that the spells were intact; then, satisfied with the results, she put it aside and started on the next one.

With her mind so focussed on the task at hand, or on dreary thoughts of the future, it took a while for her to notice that one of the refugees had joined her atop the carcass: it was Moleburr, the only member of the group who hadn't seemed overly troubled by her outburst- immediately recognisable by his distinctive shuffle; having lost his shoes in Nome Invasion, he'd borrowed a pair of bathroom slippers during their stay in the manor, and while he evidently like liked them enough to keep them, they were at least two sizes too big.

Now that he'd managed to clamber awkwardly up the cliff-like shoulder of the dead Nome and make his way across its cratered body, he sat down less than a few feet away from Elphaba, cross-legged and silent, his gaze focussed somewhere on the horizon. After a while, he reached into the depths of his backpack and drew a newspaper from its cluttered depths; from what she could see from this distance, it looked as though as it had seen plenty of reading already.

Nonetheless, for the next ten minutes, he sat there and read.

Elphaba reflected that, had anyone emerged from the forest and happened to see him at that point, the image would have bordered on the surreal: a balding, middle-aged Gillikin dressed in the tattered remains of a business suit and an old pair of tartan slippers, sitting on the mountainous corpse of a human/earth-elemental hybrid, reading the last issue of a newspaper whose writers, editors and printers were either running for their lives or dead.

Question was, did Moleburr do this out of sheer boredom- because there was nothing else to do but read a newspaper he'd likely read a few hundred times already- or was he just clinging to old routines in the only way he knew how?

After ten minutes had gone by, he folded up the newspaper, and spoke: it took a while for Elphaba to work out what he was saying, because the Gillikin's voice barely rose above a murmur. However, when she finally discerned words among the low, whirring tones, she was quite taken aback when she realised that those words were, "I apologise for my colleague's behaviour."

Out of all the things she'd been expecting to hear from the refugees (barring Curter, perhaps), an apology was not among them; hearing the words from someone as tight-lipped as Moleburr- one of Brollan's closest associates, no less- made it all the more astonishing.

"Apology accepted," she muttered, trying not to let the shock register in her voice, and returned to work. However, Moleburr didn't get up to leave; he remained sitting there, re-reading the headlines, his face impassive as ever. After a few minutes, Elphaba set aside the belt-plate she'd just finished detaching, and asked, "What exactly brought this on? In case you forgot, I gave your partner a second-degree burn to the face- not exactly proportionate retribution."

"He's had worse happen to him," said Moleburr. "He was once knifed through the hand in a game of cards." Seeing Elphaba's shocked expression, he elaborated: "The other gambler accused him of cheating; Brollan got angry and threatened to force-feed him an entire box of gaming chips. Unfortunately, the man took him seriously, and stabbed him clean through his left hand before he could even reach for the box."

In spite of herself, Elphaba laughed. "Had he actually been cheating?" she asked eventually.

"I don't know. He never admitted the truth, not even to me. But he's always been that way, always getting angry over the slightest things, always provoking people, and always too proud to admit to a mistake."

"Haven't you ever tried to change his mind? From what I've seen, he actually listens to you."

"There's a limit to how much he'll listen to, I'm afraid. Besides, his aggression can be useful if I can point it in the right direction: after all, it made us rich; it allowed our business to expand throughout Gillikin Country. Unfortunately, it means I have to spend my free time writing formal apologies to everyone who Brollan managed to aggravate in the previous week- or announcing them, in your case… and worrying."

"Worrying about what? We're not exactly running short on things to worry about, in case you hadn't noticed."

"I thought it was obvious: I worry about Brollan."

"And why's that? Has he ever thanked for your help? Has he ever let you know that he appreciates the fact that you've always been there to clean up his mess, to write apologies for him, to keep the business stable? Has he done anything to justify you giving a damn about him?"

Moleburr gave her a meaningful look. "Did Nessarose do anything to justify you giving a damn about _her?"_ he asked.

There was a dreadful silence, as Elphaba took a very deep breath, suppressed an eruption of rage, took an even deeper breath, and asked, "What exactly gave you the idea that I had that kind of relationship with my sister?"

"A few things here and there," said Moleburr vaguely. "You already told us that you were only allowed a place at Shiz so you could care for her. As for the rest… well, you'd be amazed at the things people say to fill the silence. Gnoll, for example, had a bit to say about your outburst in the study. But back to the question; did-"

"She wasn't always as crazy as she was in her final months, you know," Elphaba interrupted. "And besides, she was my sister. What makes you think she _needed_ to justify my caring for her? I'd been responsible for her safety ever since she was allowed outside the house: when you're told to care for a loved one- a loved one who's paralysed from the waist down, by the way-, you don't stop and think, "does she deserve it or not?" You just do what's expected of you and make sure that she doesn't get hurt!"

Moleburr nodded. "My point exactly: I never asked myself whether or not Brollan deserved my help, either. He and I aren't brothers, of course; in fact, at times, I feel its best that I think of myself a doctor with a particularly accident-prone patient- not too far from the truth," he added surreptitiously. "And he might not be crippled… but sometimes, I wonder if there is something wrong with his mind, more than just a bad temper, more than just childishness… and that's why I worry.

"I noticed just how often Brollan went out of his way to get on your nerves. More to the point, I noticed that he succeeded twice: the first time, you stopped just short of throwing him to his death; the second time, you left him with burns to the face… and, judging by the damage you did to the forest, you could have done even worse to him. And I know that Brollan always manages to avoid learning from his mistakes: he didn't learn from the knife to the hand, he didn't learn from the lawsuits, and he certainly won't learn anything from his confrontation with you. One day, he'll meet someone with all your power and none of your self-restraint; one day, he'll anger somebody who'll kill him without a second thought."

There was a very long silence.

"Of course," Moleburr continued, "There's no telling if he and I will survive this debacle or not, is there? Even with you on our side, it's still a gamble." He stood for a moment, stretched with a series of vicious pops, and sat back down again, immersing himself in his well-read newspaper.

It took a while for Elphaba to realise what he'd just said. "Are you saying you actually _trust_ me?" she said incredulously.

Moleburr looked up from the newspaper, and offered a rare smile. "If you wanted to kill any of us, Elphaba, I doubt you'd have stopped at second degree burns." And with an air of great finality, he continued reading, having said more in ten minutes than he had in the last few days.

Not too long after that, Rasp awkwardly hauled himself onto the corpse, scrabbling his way up the ragged stump of the dead Nome's throat.

"Let me guess," said Elphaba, her tone almost completely deadpan. "You're here to tell me that my little explosion finally convinced you that I'm simply too volatile to have around and you'll be leaving with all the other refugees within the hour."

"Er… yes and no," Rasp mumbled.

"What does that mean, exactly? If you're trying to talk like a politician, you're trying a little too hard, Rasp."

Rasp blushed. "Sorry. But the point remains: Brollan's goading aside, I think you can be trusted. You can help us. Trouble is, I can't speak for everyone else; with the way people are moping down there, it's starting to look as though they're ready to give up and go home."

"But they don't have homes to go back to!"

"Well, if that's the case, we have absolutely nothing to worry about! My constituents are _such_ sensible people, as you know by now."

Elphaba honestly couldn't tell if Rasp was trying to be funny or just being cynical; the apparently cheerful grin on his face was almost identical to the exasperated rictus he wore in times of stress. So she asked, "What did you come up here to talk to me about, then?"

"I wanted to ask you a question; it's about my… predecessors. Secretary Boq and Governor Nessarose, I mean; you told me that I was a lot luckier than Boq, but you did get a bit evasive when I started asking what happened to him, so-"

Elphaba threw up her hands. "He's the Tin Man, okay?"

Rasp opened his mouth to reply, and immediately shut it again; for a good ten seconds, he sat there in total silence, his mouth flapping helplessly as he tried to compose a suitable rejoinder. "Okay then," he said at last, "He's the Tin Man. Fair enough… um, are we talking about the same person? I mean, is he _the_ Tin Man- tall, metallic, wields an axe- the genuine article?"

In spite of herself, Elphaba couldn't help but smile at Rasp's incredulity. "That's right," she said, barely suppressing a laugh.

Rasp let the breath his outwards through his clenched teeth. "What the hell," he muttered. "It's not as if it's the weirdest thing you've told me in the last few days. Normally, I'd ask if it'd help if I gave up and went mad, but I'm pretty sure I've gone nuttier than a barrel of acorns already, so tell me, how did a Munchkin assistant become a six foot-tall metal killing machine?"

"Do you remember what I told you back in the study? Nessa's only experience using magic came about because I was stupid enough to leave the Grimmerie open on the floor: the only spell she cast was on Boq."

"You mean _she_ transformed him? She… but how? I mean, the Tin Man said you enchanted his axe to cut off all his limbs- was it anything like that?"

"No, no: my sister didn't transform him." She offered an ironic little grin. "Nessarose had been in love with him ever since her university days; she didn't want to ruin his life _that_ badly. She tried to cast a love spell on him, and she botched it: it destroyed his heart, left him on the brink of death. So, at short notice, I had to transform him into something that could survive without a heart."

She allowed Rasp a moment to consider this.

"Boq blamed me, swore revenge… and went on to lead the witch-hunts against me. Nessa fell to pieces and ended up getting flattened by the Gale House while conducting the last press conference of her entire life. And all because I'd left the Grimmerie open on the floor," she concluded.

"… but what were you doing with the Grimmerie in the first place?"

"I was creating the Ruby Slippers," said Elphaba bluntly.

"Bwuh?"

"You see, Nessarose had been in that wheelchair her whole life, and I thought I should create something that would allow her to walk, so-"

"Stop!" Rasp commanded. "That's enough."

"You don't believe me?"

"Oh, I believe you; I've done enough digging around in the archives to know that the Ruby Slippers didn't exist until Nessarose' last days, and even if I hadn't, after everything I've seen and heard in the last few days, I've almost exhausted all my reserves of incredulity. The reason why we need to stop talking about this is because my _brain is full:_ I literally cannot hear any more without my head exploding."

Elphaba once again stifled a fit of laughter. "I really think you doubt yourself a bit much, Governor."

"Have you ever seen government-issue brains? It's not pretty, least of all when it's sprayed over everything in a ten-foot radius; it'd ruin your hat for starters."

"That's where you're wrong, Governor," said Elphaba. "You'd be amazed at how well pink works with my colour scheme."

The smile froze on Rasp's face.

Then, laughing hysterically, he very slowly concertinaed backwards into a heap, clutching his middle as though he'd been shot.

Of course, with the spectre of Glinda's fashion advice hovering in the air; it didn't take long for Elphaba to start laughing as well. Of course, as she lay there, shaking with the sheer force of her own guffawing, she gradually realised that she hadn't just been laughing at the jokes- which hadn't been _that_ funny, all things considered- but at the ludicrousness of everything that had happened in the last few days. After all, it was hard not to laugh at the fact that she had somehow managed to convince at least some of the refugees that she could be trusted: after trying so many times to draw Ozians to her side in her struggle against the Wizard and failing in every single attempt, she'd somehow managed to earn the trust of at least two!

How could you not laugh at the sheer implausibility?

* * *

Basalt still wasn't sure what he was doing.

He'd been trying to determine what he should do next for some time now, hoping that some option would present itself. But no matter how he chose to look at the situation, the fact remained that neither the King or the War Council could be entirely trusted; he'd read both the Journal and as many record ledgers as he'd been permitted to read, again and again, and each line of text justified his caution a little more.

The King, planning to control the very fabric of reality with the artefacts he'd collected, and prepared to sacrifice even his fellow Nomes for the sake of his mission. Basalt could scarcely believe it- even now, parts of his mind refused to, and tried to take solace in the fact that perhaps the King really did intend to use the power for the good of the Nomes. It didn't work.

But the War Council was no better: following the trail of ledgers, he found the generals straying further and further away from military concerns, and into civilian affairs. He found countless records indicating that nobles qualified for their positions had been dismissed almost without notice and replaced with envoys of the Council- each one granting them a stronger hold on the inner mechanisms of Nome society. Besides, assuming he could even locate them, assuming that he could reach them before the King's plan came to fruition, even if they were only a _slightly_ less destructive alternative to the King, would they even believe him?

He'd considered going to Scathelex, but he'd been unable to find him anywhere in the palace; not even the servants knew where he'd gone.

So, with nobody in a position of authority to entrust with the truth, Basalt turned to his unofficial options. He considered simply informing Glinda that Elphaba was alive and that she wouldn't need to go back in time to save her life after all; but then, as if Basalt's estimations were correct, Glinda was only to be used as an understudy to Elphaba, so this wouldn't be severe enough just to stop the King's plan.

More to the point, the success of this objective would depend on Glinda believing his testimony- on _trust,_ which could not be detected or measured by any means except through levels of emotional intuition which Basalt simply didn't possess.

Would she believe him? Would she accept his words at face value, trust him?

Or would she become angry and refuse to speak to him anymore?

Moving swiftly away from that idea, Basalt toyed with the idea of tracking down Elphaba and warning her not to continue her journey towards the Nome Dominions. Once again, he found himself beset with problems, the most obvious of them being that Elphaba would be inclined to kill him on sight. And even if he would survive long enough to explain himself, once again, there was no telling if she would even believe him or not.

So, against all logic, he went back to thinking about telling Glinda. He didn't know why; he'd already discounted the idea as unfeasible, but he thought about it all the same, entertaining the idea for as long as he could.

Eventually, he gave up, and decided it was time to present his report to the King; at least, this way he might be able to make further inquiries about Roquat's mission without appearing confrontational. This course of action found him standing right in the middle of the King's newly-furnished office, waiting patiently for the King to finish studying the book levitating just above his desk, and hoping that the King would not react violently to anything Basalt might say.

However, the King appeared too deeply immersed in reading to notice his arrival, so Basalt stood patiently before him, waiting to be addressed and taking in as much of the room as he could discern: evidently, during the construction of the palace, the King had requested that the office and all its furnishing to be carved from red marble. Basalt recalled the source of Roquat's old nickname- the red marble he had often sculpted his body from- and wondered absently if he had used the substance to memorialise his old identity.

It took perhaps a minute, but eventually, the King looked up from reading and finally noticed Basalt standing there. **"Ah,"** he whispered, a soft smile edging across his face. **"I was wondering if I should expect a visit from you soon or later. How goes your search for answers, Basalt?"**

Basalt was opening his mouth to answer when something on the King's desk caught his eye; it was a pair of golden orbs- slightly flattened at the base, so that they didn't roll off the desk- weighing down a small pile of forms and documents. Normally, Basalt wouldn't thought much of it, as he'd known high-privilege Nomes who were in the habit of collecting much stranger things and using them as office equipment.

However, Basalt couldn't dismiss these as simple ornaments; after all, he'd been face-to-face with their previous owner, enough to recognise the signature iris and pupil embossed on each orb.

They weren't just orbs.

They were eyes.

The King was using Lord Scathelex's eyes as paperweights.

Suddenly, Basalt found that the report he'd appeared in this office to present had completely slipped his mind: all he could think of were the last words the King had spoken before he'd left- an almost offhanded remark about having "an appointment to keep with Lord Scathelex"- someone who'd known too much about his plan, someone who was in the perfect position to ruin it…

_Just like Basalt._

Self-preservation instincts kicked in.

Basalt improvised.

"Not too well at present, Your Majesty," he lied. "I have uncovered a few leads, but nothing conclusive. For the moment, I believe it would be better if I discontinued my search for the time being and resumed my protection duties."

"**A wise decision,"** the King conceded.

"How has Glinda fared in my absence?"

"**She pushes herself too hard, I fear; in the last eighteen hours, she has done little but work, and I believe it is having a detrimental effect on her health, both mental and physical… hence why I am going to allow her some relaxation time in an environment built specifically for her comfort."**

Basalt considered this: though he couldn't deny that it might give Glinda a chance to recuperate, it was still a risky move on the part of the King. After all, the War Council's return couldn't be postponed forever, and delaying Glinda's work could jeopardise everything… unless he was counting on Elphaba arriving before the Council did.

"**However," **the King continued, **"Though I can provide the venue, Glinda would no doubt resist any further intervention on my part. That's where you come in: you are to act as both an observer and a participant in Glinda's recovery time; to monitor her for any sign of instability and to keep her mind occupied on things other than work; and, as always, to ensure her physical safety."**

"As you wish, Your Majesty. When am I to begin?"

The King smiled. **"Who said you haven't already?"** And with a wave of a hand, the King, his office and all its contents faded from Basalt's vision; Basalt scarcely had enough time to realise that he'd just been teleported before he found himself standing less than a few feet away from Glinda herself.

"… very hard to finish my work without the Grimmerie," she was saying. "Or pen and paper. Or a desk. I'm saying I actually _need _any of that, but it would be a big help. Hello? Is anybody there?" She turned, and finally noticed that she was no longer alone.

* * *

Several explanations later, Glinda took a deep breath and massaged her temples. This wasn't how she'd hoped to be spending the afternoon, all things considered: if the King wanted her to actually get the job done, wouldn't it be better if she did it as quickly as possible rather than dithering around with free time and coffee breaks? Unfortunately, she tried to voice this opinion to Basalt, who naturally felt the need to make his boss's opinion on the subject clear:

"The King feels you are pushing yourself too hard," Basalt had intoned. "He wishes you to relax so that your work will not be affected by fatigue or distraction."

"And I suppose he's doing that just because he's such a nice guy," Glinda replied acidly.

Basalt hesitated. "You _have_ made considerable progress in translating the spells," he pointed out. "Perhaps His Majesty is also rewarding your diligence thus far."

"Well that's very sweet of him, but don't you think it would be a whole lot better if I could just get back to work and finish up with the translatification? I mean, that way, before the week's out, he'll be human, I'll be back in the past, and you'll be… you'll… actually, that's a thought- what _will_ you do when all this is over and done with?"

"I will most likely be reassigned to a different guest if there is one, or promoted."

"Fair enough. But my point is, since I've been working so hard, shouldn't I just continuate? Just because I've fallen asleep at my desk once or twice doesn't mean I'm in danger of going stir crazy. And more importantly, where exactly is this "environment built specifically for my comfort" exactly?"

"We should be standing at its centre."

Glinda looked around her: at present, the two of them were standing in a tiny circle of light at the middle of a vast cavern; the ceiling was so high it all but vanished into the shadows overhead, and the walls had long since gone the same way. So, where did relaxation come into all this? Nowhere, it seemed: no soothing music, no clouds of incense and perfume, no soft furnishings, nothing interesting to occupy, and almost no light- just hard, smooth stone underfoot. But then, would anything in this underground palace have been able to really put her at ease? After all, this was the home of the man who'd destroyed the Emerald City and had, by now, almost certainly conquered the rest of Oz; other than the chance to make reparations when her task was finally finished, what the hell could the King possibly offer her?

No sooner had she thought those words, when the spotlight directed at the two of them suddenly expanded outwards to encompass the entire cavern. And as the light bloomed, shapes began to appear- hazy, transparent forms that rose through the floor like ghosts; at first, they seemed almost featureless, but as they took their places around the massive cavern, they slowly became more and more detailed, enough to be recognisable as buildings, roads, and even crowds of spectral pedestrians. However, it wasn't until colour finally blossomed across the city that Glinda finally realised what was taking shape before her eyes.

"Miss Glinda, are you alright?" Basalt whispered.

"Oh, I'm fine," said Glinda, trying vainly to stop her voice from shaking. "I just didn't think that Nome King would conjure a city I saw him destroy." She took a deep breath, and tried to steady herself. "What in the name of Oz are we doing here? Why would he want me to see this? Why would he think I'd be able to relax here- among illusions of people _he killed!"_

Some of the illusory pedestrians looked up at this outburst, and eyed Glinda curiously before returning to their non-existent business, making very obvious attempts to avoid looking in her general direction. Across the street, a gentleman muttered, "I suppose the Witch must be getting to some people worse than others." Glinda herself didn't know whether or not she should laugh at this: everything was exactly as it had been, right down to the reaction to a public outburst.

"Do you wish to leave?" Basalt asked.

Glinda sighed deeply. "No," she said wearily. "I'll play along for now; heaven knows I don't really have a choice in the matter. Now, let's see…" Smothering her frustrations, she glanced up at the nearest signpost, and realised that she knew this particular street quite well: in the earliest days of her career, not too long after Elphaba had taken flight, Glinda had found herself visiting it time and again, always making her way to the café that was the centrepiece of this odd little street.

Back then, she'd taken advantage of the building's oddly hushed atmosphere to meet and talk with friends. Then, as her social standing began to grow and her "friends" steadily drifted away from her little sphere of influence, it became a place to meet Fiyero, who was making his own ascent through the ranks of the guard. Then, as Fiyero became busier (and more anxious to see Elphaba again), she used it as a place to unwind by herself; and then, in the aftermath of Elphaba's death, Glinda had taken the reins of power, and she simply hadn't the time to attend again. But perhaps now, in the conjured ghost of the Emerald City, she could pay one last visit- if only to see how well the King had recreated it…

"This way," Glinda commanded, and began marching briskly down the street towards the café, Basalt plodding obediently after her. Oddly enough, nobody seemed to find anything strange about the seven foot-tall rock monster at her heel; in fact, most of the pedestrians didn't even seem to notice him. But then, from what little she knew of magical illusions, the ones that were designed to mimic people didn't really think; they just followed the set tasks their creator had given them, repeating them again and again until they were given new tasks or simply dismissed.

A pang of sorrow rippled through Glinda: days ago, these people had been real, with lives of their own, with families, and hopes for the future. Now, they were all dead, either slaughtered by the invading armies or reduced to statues by the spell of petrification; now, all that remained of these people, apart from the eroding husks that dotted the ruins of the Emerald City, were these mindless illusions that their murderer had conjured. And for what? Was the King doing this to watch her reaction? Was he playing mind-games? Or- Glinda's eyes narrowed in suspicion- maybe he was trying to give her an incentive to work even harder, by showing just how many lives she'd save by going back in time.

Hastily burying her sadness under the growing pile of questions, Glinda carried on down the street, keeping her face almost completely expressionless; if this really _was_ some kind of sick game on the King's part, she wouldn't give him the satisfaction of seeing her cry. After all, she'd been told to relax here, and the café- the one place in this mirage where she _could_ relax- was in sight at long last, the tarnished sign above the door gleaming invitingly in the artificial sunlight.

Stepping tentatively through the door, she was immediately greeted by one of the waiters, who all but leapt from behind the counter with a muted shout of "Welcome back, Miss Glinda!"

Without warning, Glinda was wearing the same confident, bubbly smile that she'd always worn in public since the day the Wizard had declared her "The Good Witch." It was all an elaborate mask, of course, used regardless of her true feelings. Once, a very, _very_ long time ago, she'd found it painful to force a smile and fake happiness; now, the mask slid into place so readily it frightened her.

"Good to see you again, Hallingstam," she said automatically. "Is my table vacant?"

"Always, Miss Glinda, always. I'll be bringing along your usual order along shortly." The waiter turned inquiringly in Basalt's direction, and Glinda realised that this illusion was slightly more advanced than the others; it "saw" that there was someone standing beside her, though it obviously didn't notice Basalt's appearance. "Will your friend want anything in particular?" the illusory waiter asked politely.

"No thank you," Basalt uttered. For someone without much emotion, he'd somehow managed to do a very good job of looking uncomfortable.

The two of them took their places at Glinda's usual table at the back of the café, where the lights were dimmest and the already-dampened sounds of the outside world faded into nothingness. For several minutes, they sat in silence; Glinda's usual order arrived, and for the next few minutes, Glinda actually found herself drinking a cup of coffee that didn't really exist, and helping herself to a slice of cake made out of thin air. And all the while, Basalt sat, apparently lost in thought, his chin in his hands.

The minutes dragged on.

Finally, Glinda's curiosity got the better of her. "You know how you told me that Nomes earn emotions as they're promoted?" she asked.

Basalt nodded.

"Well, are there any emotions that you _can't_ be given? I mean, are you or any of the other Nomes forbidden from being given compassion, for example?"

"Not to my knowledge, Miss Glinda."

"Alright then… is there any way of removing your emotions?"

"None are known to me, Miss Glinda."

Not for the first time that day, Glinda found herself massaging her temples in annoyance. She didn't know why she was so desperate to know the answer to this; after all, it wasn't as if knowing how the supposedly compassionate Nomes could do what they'd done to Oz would really put her mind at ease. In fact, it'd probably just upset her. But somewhere in the back of her skull, her curiosity- which hadn't aged a day since her time at Shiz- was stomping its foot and demanding to know. So, after a few seconds of hemming and hawing, Glinda asked, "Can Nomes ever turn their emotions off?"

"I have heard that Nomes who have grown accustomed to emotions can ignore their effects, but that is all. If you will forgive my curiosity, Miss Glinda, why is it that you wish to know any of this?"

Glinda finally released the sigh that had been building for the last minute. Once again, she'd had the answer staring her in the face, and she'd been too idiotically childish to see it: of course the King and the other high-ranking Nomes could feel compassion- they just knew how to ignore when the need arose! After all, hadn't the Wizard been able to do exactly that? He'd been kindly and jovial in person, even while destroying the rights of the Animals, even while plotting the deaths of Nessarose and Elphaba. Why would it be any different with the Nomes who'd succeeded in ticking every single box on the emotional checklist? And why oh why did she have to keep _thinking_ about every little thing these days?

"It doesn't matter," she said wearily. "I'm just surprised you even want to be promoted considering how badly the higher-ups have been acing since I arrived."

"They are not all like Scathelex and his assassin," Basalt pointed out. "Some Nomes exercise compassion and sympathy more than others. Moreover, I could not refuse the call to promotion even if I wanted to."

"Turning down a promotion is against the law? How does that even work?"

"It is not the law that forbids us from refusing, but our instincts: all of us begin life without emotion or personality, empty except for the implanted urge to attain the privileges of higher rank and "understand what it means to feel as well as think," as our Glorious Forefather put it. I cannot resist this urge, any more than I can resist an order from a superior."

For some reason, Glinda found herself wondering what Elphaba would have thought of this had she still been alive to hear Basalt's words. She'd have probably have been deeply suspicious of it, if not openly outraged. After all, this implanted instinct sounded like a very underhanded way for the Nobles and the King to control the population, unless Glinda had misunderstood the concept, of course; Elphaba would have no doubt started asking questions, and talked Basalt into taking her to a library to study the subject, before attacking the King head-on with what she'd learned. _Then again,_ Glinda thought bitterly, _if Elphaba were still alive, the Nome invasion would probably never have succeeded. Hell, it probably wouldn't have gotten past the planning stage._

"Do you even want to be promoted, though?" she asked aloud. "I mean, what exactly do you want out of life?"

"Well, now that I have experienced curiosity and initiative, I am interested in seeing what other promotions might-"

"No, no, no; what do you want in life _besides _promotion?"

For once, Basalt looked almost completely thrown by one of Glinda's questions. "I do find that research holds a certain appeal," he said at last.

Glinda fought the urge to groan in despair and embarrassment. _Okay, so I guess the implanted instinct doesn't really count as a means of population control if they're already born without emotions or free will. Speaking of which…_

"How old are you, Basalt?"

Basalt was silent for almost half a minute, his stone brow furrowed in concentration. Eventually, he announced, "I do not know the precise date of my creation, but I have been able to narrow it down to approximately twelve years ago."

Glinda opened her mouth to say something, and then quickly closed it, realising that there was absolutely nothing she could possibly say in response. "You're a kid?" would have just been silly considering who and what Basalt was; "What was it like growing up in the Nome Dominions?" sounded even more vapid, especially since he'd never "grown up" or even been a child in the first place; and "Who were your parents?" would have just brought up the subject of how Nomes- urgh!- reproduced, and Glinda probably wouldn't be ready for that information for a very long time.

Eventually, Basalt (who'd been skimming through the menu as the silence dragged on) asked, "Would you mind if I ordered something for myself, Miss Glinda?"

Glinda nodded mutely, and watched as the Nome called over one of the waiters and somewhat haltingly ordered a cup of tea; after stumbling through wether he wanted milk and sugar or not, the waiter scurried away and returned a few minutes later with a tray bearing a pot of tea, a bone-china cup, a small jug of milk, and a bowl of sugar, and set it quickly down on the table before leaving to attend to other, non-existent customers. It didn't take long for the two of them to realise that the only way that Basalt could possibly hold the cup was between his thumb and forefinger; so, for the next five minutes, Glinda watched in total silence as her bodyguard tentatively drank tea from a cup that, to him, was about the size of a thimble- and managed to drain the whole thing in one sip.

And then, as if the image couldn't get any more surreal, Basalt poured himself another cup, and then, holding the teaspoon between the very tips of his fingers and trying valiantly not to bend it out of shape, he began adding shovelfuls of sugar. As he drank, this time in absolutely _miniscule _sips, Glinda finally burst out laughing; it wasn't her delicate rehearsed tittering, either, just a long, drawn-out cascade of helpless giggling that almost shook her out of her chair. It was the first time in a long while that she'd laughed with genuine mirth at _anything, _and it went on until her lungs started to hurt.

Meanwhile, Basalt was looking at her with a look of profound confusion on his face; Glinda was about to try and explain herself, when she realised that Basalt had given up trying to drink from a cup, and had started just adding milk and sugar to the pot of tea, which naturally made her laugh even harder.

"S… S… sorry," she stammered between the fits of giggling. "It's the… you just… the…" She gave up, and started laughing again.

Once she'd calmed down enough to speak coherently, Glinda took a very deep breath and said blearily, "Thanks, Basalt. I really, _really_ needed that." However, as she sat up in her chair, a question occurred to her that almost made her start laughing all over again, and she voiced it tentatively: "How was the tea?"

"Palatable enough, I suppose, considering that it exists only as an illusion. Would I be correct in assuming that you have succeeded in enjoying yourself?"

Glinda only _just_ stopped herself from cracking up again.

"Pretty much," she admitted. "But," she added gleefully, "that's not what was asked of me, was it? The King wanted me to _relax._ So…" A wild, manic grin spread across her face. "Let's see if your boss included the Shattered Gem in this illusion!"

"The Shattered Gem?" echoed Basalt.

"It's a bar I used to visit when I was younger- before the Wizard declared me a "Good Witch," and before Horrible Morrible banned me from drinking alcohol in public. Maybe it's here, maybe it isn't, but either way… you don't know what I'm talking about, do you?"

"For the most part, no; I have heard of alcohol, however. What is it?"

Glinda briefly wondered how she'd managed to end up as an unofficial tutor to her own near-emotionless rock monster bodyguard, before answering, "Well, every so often, people feel the need to turn their brains off and… you know what? The bar's only a few blocks away- I'll show you…"

* * *

After five Green Haze cocktails, and a chaser of Goodbye Brain, Glinda's good mood was thoroughly secured, although she did feel a little bit unsteady on her feet as they carried her out of the bar, and her voice was slurring ever so slightly as she carried on her half of the conversation:

"… I'm just saying, I'm just _saying_ that it's really obvious that your boss, King whatshisname, the bearded thing with the crown made out of his own head… he made this from bits and pieces of my memory that he thought I'd be happy with. I mean, I visited this bar only once or twice in my entire life before it closed, and that was before the café was even built. And that boulevard there, this whole road was rebuilt a few… a few… yes, it was a few months ago. I think. And that signpost, it wasn't made to wobble around like that when I last saw it!"

"It isn't wobbling at all, Miss Glinda," said Basalt.

"Isn't it?" She reached out and prodded the offending signpost with a finger, missing it at least four times- clear evidence that the thing really _was_ moving. "Fair enough then," she mused sceptically. "I 'spose you can't really blame the King for thinking that signs are made out of rubber and windsocks; I mean, he's only got what his spies and my brain tell him, and that last one's about as reliable as a chocolate umbrella in a heatwave. Not that that wouldn't be tasty. Maybe that's what he'll do once he's got all of reality under control; make signs out of rubber. Windsock signs. Chocolate signs."

She gave herself a little shake: she was drifting a bit much for comfort, and she wanted to stay lucid for just a little bit longer; after that, she could return to the bar, have another round of drinks, and gently spiral off into the polka-dotted oblivion.

"I'm guessing that Nomes don't get drunk," she said idly, as she leant against the gently-swaying wall. "Am I right?"

"Most Nomes of my station would not know what drunkenness and alcohol are, Miss Glinda. In fact, I am not certain it has any effect on us at all."

"Shame; I think you'd be a lot more fun after a few drinks."

"Why? Does the prospect of me accidentally breaking everything I try to lift and constantly falling over sound especially "fun"?"

Glinda snickered. "For someone who hasn't earned a sense of humour yet, that wasn't bad. I think Elphaba would have liked that if she were here; come to think of it, she'd probably like you, too."

For some reason, Basalt's only reply was a long and somewhat contemplative silence. Eventually, he replied, "Somehow, I doubt that very much, Miss Glinda. If she were here, I would no doubt still be considered an enemy."

"Still?" Glinda echoed.

"I am a servant of the King who invaded Oz," he pointed out, a touch hastily. "Therefore, she would consider me an enemy."

Somewhere beneath the alcoholic funk that clouded her skull, Glinda found herself absently wondering if Basalt knew more than he let on. Had he slipped up in his first remark? Had he come to his conclusion through other means? Perhaps the Nome King had been telling him about what his all-encompassing spy network had brought back. Or… had Elphaba actually encountered Nomes while she was still alive- had actually fought them off? It sounded plausible, considering that more than half of what she'd really been up to during the reign of terror was a mystery, but could it actually be true?

As Glinda pondered this latest round of questions, her gaze wandered idly across the street and settled on one of the nearest citizens- the illusion of a tall, burly figure in a greatcoat leaning against the wall. She presumed it was a man, judging by the shape of its body under the coat, but she couldn't figure out why this illusory character had drawn her eye until she looked closely, and realised that the "man" had been staring at her for the past several minutes.

And he had been doing so without eyes.

From the nose upwards, his face was just a blank expanse of skin, cratered with tiny luminescent patches and threaded with pulsating grey veins. _He's not an illusion,_ she thought, _he's stolen one of the illusions and he's using it as a disguise- and wearing it out, obviously. _

No sooner had this thought flown through her head, when the creature hiding beneath the illusion let out a weird, ululating scream and charged. Ducking out of the path of the oncoming monster, Glinda had just enough time to see the last of its already frayed disguise collapse, allowing her to see the creature for what it was as it turned to face her:

Though hunched and clearly bent forward, it stood at well over six feet tall, made all the taller by the long, whiplike arms it flailed over its head. Under the artificial sunlight overhead, the creature's pitch-black skin appeared to shimmer like water, and it could have been the cocktails talking again, but Glinda was certain she could see tiny fanged mouths opening and shutting on every available patch of skin- except for the head, which was dominated by a gaping wound-like maw framed by dozens of grasping hands.

It let out another challenging bellow and lunged at Glinda; Basalt was already stepping forward to block its approach, when a second creature dropped from one of the rooftops and latched onto his throat, its tusk-tipped arms ripping into the Nome's defenceless back in a wild frenzy. So, with her wand left back in her room a few hundred stories above her, her only bodyguard trying to fight off his own attacker, and the Nome King apparently uninterested, Glinda improvised.

She'd never been very good at performing magic without the aid of a wand- but then again, up until a year ago, she hadn't been much good at any kind of magic, and right now, she didn't have a choice. So, in the last minute before the charging monster reached her, she drew upon all the magic she could at short notice, and sent it ploughing into the thing's body. But instead of being flung backwards or knocked to the ground, the creature…

… _burst…_

"Oh, dis-_gusting!"_ Glinda yelped.

There was a loud thud behind her, and Basalt asked, "Are you alright, Miss Glinda?"

"Apart from having about nine pounds of liquefactoried guts splattered all over my dress, I'm fine! How about you?"

As it happened, the monster had actually managed to inflict very deep wounds on Basalt's stone body, and had even managed to bite two of his fingers off before he'd finally managed to snap the thing's neck. For good measure, he'd been slimed up to his elbows in the creature's blood.

"It could have been worse," Basalt mused. "They were only juveniles, judging by their size."

"You mean you know what these things are?"

He nodded ponderously. "They are called Stygian Hungers; subterranean predators that live miles beneath Nome territory. Most of the adults are hibernating at this time of year, while the younger ones spend their time hunting for food… which diet can include Nomes."

Glinda's jaw dropped. "These things can _eat_ Nomes?"

"If their spirits remain in their bodies while being devoured."

"Then why are they going after the two of us when there's a buffet table of Nomes just waiting to be eaten not too far above us? Why aren't these Thingummy Hungers trying to attack the Palace?"

"Because they are not stupid; the Hungers know that they would not be able to burrow through the Palace walls without being killed, so they prefer to ambush isolated targets. Also, the young Hungers have great difficulty organising large groups; the hunting parties rarely get larger than four members at a time. Or smaller for that matter…"

For a moment, the two of them stared at one another as the implications of what Basalt had just said tumbled into place. Their eyes briefly strayed over one another's shoulders (or in Glinda's case, under Basalt's left armpit). Then, in perfect unison, they shouted, "_Behind you!_"

Not even bothering to turn around, Glinda half-jumped half-fell to the left and flung another blast of concussive force at the Hunger that had been charging towards Basalt. Basalt, who was evidently bright enough to follow the cue, didn't bother to turn around either: instead, as the Hunger that had been dashing towards Glinda came within arm's reach, he drew back his fist and struck it hard in the chest.

Seconds later, the two of them stood, once again alone amongst the illusions, and once again soaked in purplish-green sludge.

Then, there was a distant rumbling overhead, and the Nome King's voice boomed, **"WELL DONE! OF COURSE, YOU MAY BE INTERESTED TO KNOW THE EXACT R-"**

"Stop shouting!" Glinda shrilled back. "We're not deaf!"

A spate of muffled laughter shook the ground, and once it had subsided, the King spoke in a much lower voice. **"As I was saying, now that you've had some time to yourselves and proved my theory that you really **_**can**_** get drunk on illusory alcohol, you may be interested to know the exact reason why I sent you down here in the first place."**

"Well, given that we were nearly mugged by a gang of monsters, I didn't think you sent us down here to relax or anything like that."

"**Oh, believe me, that was one objective among many. But truth be told, Lord Scathelex's hired assassin proved a lot faster than I gave him credit; after his escape, I could hardly afford to let him drift around the Dominions, waiting for an opportunity to derail the plan. So, I set a trap; you can easily guess at the bait I used, but as for the prey…"**

There was an earsplitting caterwaul from somewhere far above them, and Glinda looked up just in time to see the familiar figure of the assassin drop from the shadowy cavern roof and hit the ground with a crash, immediately shattering into a dozen pieces. "Bastards," the assassin's head screamed. "Treacherous, regicidal bastards!"

"**I'm sure you've already been introduced. I found him skulking in a tunnel just a few feet below you- leading a pack of Stygian Hungers****up from the depths to attack in his stead!" **He laughed derisively. **"**_**Stygian Hungers**_**, of all things! You might as well harness a gust of wind to shuffle a deck of cards. But then, you can hardly blame our friend, here: he probably thought that you had another egg ready."**

From the clatter of broken limbs, the assassin raged impotently: "LET ME OUT OF THIS BODY!" he bellowed. "RELEASE ME! RELEASE ME! When they find out what you've done to me and my employer, the War Council will _bury _you, you senescent pile of rubble! They will lay the foundations for their rebuilt kingdom on your pulverized corpse! They will rend your soul and feast upon your psyche! As for the Protector, they will make him eat himself alive until his very soul broils within his redigested throat!"

"**He never shuts up, does he?"**

"Pot, kettle," said Glinda snidely.

"**Fair enough. I'll allow him some time to get his feelings off his chest before I sweep this rubble into a cell. What do you think?"**

"And you, Glinda, the Council will ensure you _survive your own execution! My masters will rip your head off and keep it alive for all eternity! They will impale you through the stump of your throat and force you to recant your deeds against the War Council until time itself unravels around your decomposed ears! We will make you watch as we dredge the souls of your pathetic mortal kin from the hereafter and DEVOUR THEM-"_

The last leg of the assassin's speech was drowned out by the sound of his own already-broken body vanishing in what looked and felt like a miniaturized blast from an active volcano. And when the King spoke again, his voice was devoid of the amusement that had flooded it before; **"As I was saying,"** he hissed icily at the bubbling pile of slag that had once been the assassin, **"It might be advisable to show courtesy to my guests… and to avoid making the kind of threats that I've seen the council gladly carry out."**

For almost half a minute of anxious silence, Glinda and Basalt stared up at the roof where the Nome King presumably watched, not daring to say anything. Eventually, though, the King's voice sighed deeply. **"I apologise for my outburst," **he murmured, his voice almost soft by his normal standards. **"It seems that some things still annoy me more than others…"**

"I'd… like to be returned to my room, now, please," said Glinda hesitantly. "I'm going to have to wash this gunk off sooner or later… and I'll also need to get back to work soon if we want to finish on time."

"**Of course. If you'd just care to hold still for a minute…"**

As the concluding wisps of the teleportation spell began to trace their way across her vision, Glinda was readying herself for the displacing lurch that every one of these spells tended to end with, when she happened to hear the King say, **"Before you return to your normal duties, Basalt, I think you and I need to have a word in private…"**

And then, everything faded away…

* * *

"**Tell me,"** said the King, as his latest body took shape, **"On your journey to Munchkinland, what did you find more enlightening? Discovering Eldrect and his retinue, or meeting Elphaba?"**

Had Basalt possessed a heart, it would have skipped a beat. In reality, his mind raced: the King knew that he'd found the abominations, knew that he'd spoken to the dying Lord Eldrect, knew that Elphaba was alive and well- and that he knew the King's plan.

And this likely meant that Basalt was going to die very soon.

"**Don't even think of lying to me, Basalt,"** the King warned gently. **"I know where you went, who you spoke to; I have spies that even the most accomplished of our Kind cannot find. So tell me, who was more enlightening? Eldrect or Elphaba? Or perhaps it was that wondrous book that I and my forbears have kept hidden from the rest of our people ever since the First King put pen to paper?"**

"It is hard to say, Your Majesty," said Basalt, who could only think back to the stolen eyeballs on the King's desk and wonder if a similar fate was in store for him.

"**I can imagine."**

The King was now pacing idly around the cavern, a miniscule tongue of flame swirling around his fingers. Was he trying to pass the time, or was he readying a blast of fire that would sear Basalt out of existence?

"Are you going to kill me?" Basalt asked softly.

The King smiled. **"There'd be little point to that, Basalt: you're not a member of the War Council; you're not one of their prize lackeys; and you certain haven't set out to inform anyone of what I've done- though you've certainly **_**thought**_** about it. Besides, even if you do eventually decide to try to be a responsible Nome and remove an obvious lunatic from power, you've got two very serious disadvantages working against you. Can you guess what they are?"**

Basalt thought carefully. "The most obvious source of assistance is out of reach, and those that are within reach will not believe me," he hazarded.

"**A good try. But in truth, your most serious problems are engraved upon your very psyche: firstly, you're a Protector to Glinda. Now, when that position was first established, its creators made certain that anyone of that rank would be magically bound to protect their designated ward- after all, how else could you make someone with so few emotions care for another? I've seen how you behave: you try to anticipate her actions; you try to determine what she thinks; and though you have no concern of your own, you make every effort to protect her. True, you innovate and investigate on your own terms, but with a fervour that only the bond can explain." **The King's smile broadened. **"If you were to tell her of my plan- and get her to believe you-, I would be forced to set her free… but you wouldn't be able to continue protecting her, and that chain of magic buzzing away inside your head wouldn't let you even **_**dream**_** of her being released from your care."**

"And the other disadvantage?" Basalt asked.

"**Quite simply, your own curiosity."**

"I don't follow, Your Majesty."

"**You still don't know what the artefacts are; you know what they do, but you don't know what they truly are and what I will eventually do with them. You don't even know where I found them, or how I discovered their secrets. And you like to indulge your curiosity now that you have it, Basalt; you find it so very hard to resist. Curiosity may kill the cat, but satisfaction brings it back, as they say. You want to know, don't you? **_**Don't you?"**_

For some reason, even though he already knew that the King was right, Basalt found it very hard to answer this question. But eventually, he replied, "Yes, Your Majesty."

"**Then all I ask is that you remain patient; that you continue to care for Glinda, and wait for just a few short days. Then, all the secrets will be unveiled, and you shall have a very well-deserved reward. All good things come to those who wait- remember that, Basalt. Now, do excuse me…"**

With that, the King vanished into the ground, his presence rocketing back up towards the palace, leaving Basalt alone in the cavern, amidst illusions that were already beginning to fade away.

* * *

Unsurprisingly, the King hadn't left anything to chance; the moment Basalt left the cavern, he felt the faint presence of two Nome spies tailing him.

The situation had somehow managed to deteriorate even further: not only was he too far away to call for help from the War Council, unable to get a closer source of assistance to believe him, and working against his own mind, but the King no longer trusted him.

As he wearily returned to Glinda's cell, it occurred to Basalt that there was a human word to describe the current situation- one that he'd heard Glinda herself use many times in moments of frustration.

What was it, again?

Oh yes.

"Fucked."


	21. The Herald

A/N: Ha-_ha!_ I got the next chapter up within a month! In this chapter- shock therapy, shockwaves and schemes! Read, review, and above all enjoy, ladies and gentlemen!

Disclaimer: Wicked, and all the other titles of the Oz franchise do not belong to me, and if they did, the characters within would have done their best to reach through the pages and strangle me.

* * *

Far beyond the Land of Oz, a storm was brewing over Dr Worley's clinic.

Had Kansas been home to anyone with even a thimbleful of supernatural power, they would have noticed the subtle traces of magic about those ominous storm-clouds, and known that someone or something had conjured them… and more.

But, as Kansas had never been a home to practitioners of the mystical arts, nobody noticed anything out of the ordinary about it. Indeed, few people even noticed the storm at all: Dr Worley was too busy preparing his machines for Dorothy Gale's treatment; the orderlies were all engaged with their usual chores around the clinic; Nurse Wilson was down in the cellar, checking that the locks were secure; and Dorothy Gale, alone in her cell, was too worried about her upcoming treatment to look out the window and notice the clouds advancing across the horizon.

But down in the cellar, the unofficial patients noticed.

They were the earliest visitors to the clinic: some of them had been willing participants- sufferers of cluster headaches, epilepsy and other ailments, desperate for the cure that Electric Healing represented. Others had been "donations" from asylum directors who'd been eager to dispose of especially troublesome inmates. One way or the other, they'd all become Dr Worley's first test subjects. To his disappointment, all of them had been damaged before he could find a voltage suitable for positively affecting the human brain; rendered almost incapable of attending to their most basic needs, the patients were hastily removed from all official records, bundled into straightjackets and locked in the cage-like enclosures beneath the house. And there they'd stayed for the last few months, at least until Worley could refine the treatment well enough to cure them of their additional maladies. After all, he reasoned, it really was just a matter of controlling excess currents.

Had he been aware of the weather outside, he would have found it quite appropriate that they'd known of the encroaching thunderstorm. But at that moment in time, all he knew was that the damaged patients would need another dose of chloroform to quiet their screaming.

The spectral form of Ozma had also noticed the storm, and knew that it was another move in the King's overarching game. All she could do, however, was watch from the vantage point she'd managed to secure and hope that she could make her own, small move at some point; it probably would only be enough to prove a setback to the King's plan, but it had to better than sitting back and watching the King claim victory over everything. But whatever she was going to do, it would have to be sooner rather than later:

Not too far from the clinic, a portal was opening.

* * *

Meanwhile, on the western border of Oz, where the overgrown forest merged with the sands of the Desert, the opposite end of the portal began to open, sending a shockwave of mystical energies into the night and across the countryside at an incredible rate. In a startling display of synchronicity, people gave it almost the same amount of attention the thunderstorm had been given back in Kansas; the energies of the shockwave were so subtle and diffuse, few noticed it sweeping through them.

But amidst the many thousands of refugees, fugitives, collaborators, and prisoners that composed the population of Oz and the territories of its new ruler at that time, there _were_ a rare few that felt the tingle of mystic energies upon their skin. Most of them were those who'd been exposed to powerful magic, or changed by it in some way; practitioners of magic felt it as well, only magnified a hundredfold- to the point that it was all but impossible to ignore.

But nobody in all of Oz or the Nome Territories- save one- could even guess at what had happened, or what it could mean.

* * *

Deep within the crumbling ruins of the Emerald City, aged and weather-beaten by its regent's experiments with temporal magic, Tik-Tok's tarnished body remained hidden within the vault, his works having long since wound down into dormancy. Once he'd been told what to expect, he hadn't been troubled by the long wait he would have to endure before reactivation; instead, he'd paced the room until his action ran down, then stood and pondered the situation until his thought ran down, and then finally drifted off to the clockwork equivalent of sleep. But as the shockwave swept through the ruins, it happened to permeate his oxidised copper shell, and deep within him, a few of his gears spun once more- if only for a split second.

On the cold streets outside, the petrified figures of the citizenry remained still and lifeless, their minds still mercifully unconscious- all except Boq, who merely drifted in sleep, thanks to Elphaba's assistance; now, he dreamt contentedly of a woman who he'd adored and worshipped for so long her face was all but engraved upon his mind. But then the energies that the portal had unleashed flickered through him, and suddenly, he no longer dreamt of Glinda; now, he could only dream of lightning.

Not too far away, the Wheelers lay asleep on the steps of Mombi's palace, huddled together for warmth. None of them awoke at the tremor of magic passing through them, even those impossibly rare few who were attuned to it, who only mumbled sleepily and spun their wheels without meaning to.

Above them, deep within her gallery, Mombi was reading the Lead Wheeler's report, and trying to resist the temptation to roll her eyes at it. So far, she wasn't having much luck: given that the idiot could only write with the pen clenched in his teeth, the text was almost unreadable, and more than half of what _was _readable was taken up with grovelling requests for drugs. The other half briefly mentioned that a gang of Ozian resistance fighters had attempted to reclaim the City's southern quarter before being ambushed and slaughtered by the Wheelers; then, it moved swiftly on to asking if the Beautiful and Wise Princess Mombi could please stop practicing time magic on Wheeler-inhabited areas.

Mombi snarled wearily, cursing the Nome King for denying her conquest into Munchkinland… and then she felt the shockwave as it passed clean through the walls of the palace. All around her, the heads of her collection stared at one another in mingled terror and confusion, and murmured anxiously to one another about what they'd just felt, until Mombi silenced them all with an angry wave of her hand. Tossing the scrawled report aside, she began the slow march downstairs to the City Square to contact the King; she didn't know what had just happened, but it almost certainly warranted attention.

Upstairs, in the palace attic, one of Mombi's oldest experiments lay in a half-collapsed heap, his spindly limbs disconnected from his wooden body, his jack-o-lantern skull gazing morosely at the ceiling. He'd been up here ever since Mombi had moved in, and most of his time had been spent worrying that his head might begin to rot if left too long; then, he felt the pulse of magic flicker through him, making vivid orange sparks flash before his eyesockets (for he had no real eyes, just holes cut into his head).

_That was weird,_ Jack Pumpkinhead thought. _I wonder if Mom had anything to do with it._

* * *

Out on the northern border of Oz, amidst the ruins of the once-prosperous Gillikin country, the War Council finally gathered.

It had taken them far longer than necessary to make their way here, having been delayed by skirmishes by human resistance fighters, by messengers from their subordinates, by Nome bureaucrats requesting their signature for one form after another, by the cataclysmic reforestation of all Oz, and- in one particularly harrowing case- a head-on collision with a chicken farm that had somehow ended up directly in the path of one of the generals as he hastened towards the meeting ground. But at long last, against all odds, they'd finally assembled to discuss the invasion so far.

Holding the right to customise themselves to whatever ends they fancied, the twenty-seven generals there assembled virtually glittered in the moonlight, encrusted with gems or plated with gold and silver as they were. A few had built themselves exclusively for combat, replacing their fingers with cutlass-like blades and barbed spears; some even carried trophies of their many battles, racks of human skulls and fluttering banners of preserved skin hanging from their shoulders. But the most extravagant out of all of them was Lord Resherenkor, the Chairman; he'd sculpted all fifty feet of his body from magically-reinforced gold and platinum, his knuckles studded with diamonds, his colossal shoulders and back coated with sapphire-eyed statues, all human in shape, and all wailing in despair.

"My fellow lords and generals," he rumbled, "I thank you for finding the time to attend this meeting; I understand that most of you have been trying to return to the palace, or else to try and reclaim the territory we have lost to the forests, but I feel we need to plan accordingly if what we have determined is true."

"Is this anything to do with Lord Scathelex's absence?" one of the lesser generals asked.

"In part, yes: given that he was last seen on approach to the King's new palace, it would be safe to assume that he is being held against his will. In the meantime, the few of us that have been able to unite thus far have determined that the spell that covered this land in forest was not from a group of magicians loyal to the King, as we thought- but a single magician."

"What magician of our kind would dare oppose us?"

"Perhaps it is not a Nome at all," suggested another general. "Perhaps it is the witch that the King's warriors brought back from the Emerald City."

"Or the one that the King has employed to _run_ the Emerald City."

The Chairman coughed for order. "Whoever this magician is, the King is obviously using him or her to support his own delusional whims, which clearly run contrary to this council's ongoing work. Furthermore, our operatives and underlings within the Dominions report that the palace has been declared off limits to civilian personnel- clearly an attempt to restrict our influence. Because of this, I am declaring the King potentially unstable, and intend to see him removed from office pending a full appraisal of his mental health- once we have determined what he had planned to do with this magician, of course. This meeting is to decide on how we will approach the Dominions: after all, we have the main bulk of the army to contend with, along with his personal guard, and this witch he has in his employ, so we cannot wholesale slaughter our way into the palace without incurring unacceptable damage to the stability of government."

"My Lord Chairman," one of the other generals murmured, "Is it all possible that the King himself performed any of the magic we have attributed to other magicians?"

Once the laughter had died down, the Chairman replied (in the same tone of voice more commonly used for speaking with small children and the terminally brain-damaged), "I very much doubt it; after all, we were very thorough when we performed our first test of his powers: he can barely even cast a simple illumination spell. As for the…"

There was a pause, as the shockwave vanished into the distance.

"Did anyone else feel that?"

* * *

On the outskirts of Munchkinland, the refugee camp lay in the shadow of the giant Nome's corpse, fast asleep- except, of course for the watchman on duty.

Despite the argument and the depression that had followed it, most of them had gone to bed in the most optimistic of moods; after all, a few of them had reasoned, they were still alive, and now they had a way of protecting themselves from the Nomes that didn't rely on an ornery witch and a supply of explosives that felt like it was going to blow up in their faces every time they used it. It wasn't much, but it had to be worth at least something in the guerrilla war that was due to begin tomorrow.

When the shockwave swept over the camp, none of the sleeping refugees awoke or even reacted to the pulse of energy that had just breezed past; Brollan carried on muttering obscenities at nobody in particular, Rasp continued jogging directionlessly in his sleep, and Woolwax snored at a volume more commonly associated with industrial accidents.

Elphaba, meanwhile, sat bolt upright; she'd been working with magic for far too long not to recognise magic when she felt it. And the dream she'd just awoken from- the vision of that basement, crowded with people in manacles and straightjackets, screaming in mindless fear as thunder rumbled in the distance- was there any connection between the two events? Was this somehow tied with whatever the Nomes were up to?

She sighed, gathered the thickest blanket she could find, and staggered out towards the campfire. This couldn't wait until tomorrow; she needed to analyse it, _now-_ at least once she was warm enough to think straight…

"HHHHHHH_NNNNNN_KKKKK. KKKRRRRRRRRRRRRR. HHHHHHHNNNNNNNNNK_KKKKK_."

…And once she'd worked out a way of shutting out Woolwax's damnable _snoring_…

* * *

Across the Nome Dominions, several hundred million unsuspecting Nomes looked up in confusion as the magical shockwave finally dispersed itself in the skies far overhead. Magicians among the civilian populace immediately began studying it, trying to determine its source: none of them had much luck, though- the energies were far too diffuse to be examined in detail- but whatever spell had caused this tremendous shockwave had clearly been one of impossible power.

Had Glinda been in contact with any of them, she would have agreed. She, too, had been awoken by the wave of energy collapsing above the palace, and had taken a break from translating just long enough to try and guess what it was and where it might be coming from. Of course, with the need to finish the work still weighing upon her, she couldn't afford to waste too much time on trying to figure out the specifics of the shockwave, and in the end, she gave up long before any results arrived. She'd even turned down Basalt's offer to head upstairs and ask the sentries what had happened; after all, what was the point of trying to study something that might just be local weather, when there was much more important work to be done?

Basalt, meanwhile, suspected that whatever had just happened was the next stage in the King's escalating plan. Not that there was much point in reflecting on it, given that he had even less means of determining what had just happened than Glinda; if the dissipated energies _had_ been part of the plan, then heading upstairs to meddle- with two high-ranking spies following his every move and reporting them to the King- would not be among the safest potential moves. After all, the only thing that had kept him from being executed a few hours ago was the King's utterly incomprehensible generosity (he hadn't even bothered to order Basalt away from his investigations!). So, he remained in Glinda's cell, on watch, hoping that the truth would become apparent soon.

Several stories below, Fiyero was thumping on the wall and asking if one of the guards could _please_ explain what had just happened. Of course, it wasn't likely anyone could hear him, except perhaps for the mysterious Pinhead in the neighbouring cell, so he tried to guess at what he'd just felt was: maybe it had something to do with Elphaba; maybe she'd finally arrived in Nome territory, and was bombarding the palace with literally every single combat spell she could think of; maybe she'd already defeated the Nome King in single combat; maybe he would be free in the next few minutes.

_No harm in wild fantasies, I suppose_, he mused, sadly.

* * *

Next-door, "Pinhead" barely reacted to the curious electric sensation that had flickered through his crooked bones; once he'd collected his thoughts enough to think carefully on the subject, he presumed it was some new illusion that the Nome King had devised to play with his senses, a brief distraction from the avalanche of monstrous visions and noises that were no doubt due to assault his senses. But then, he'd experienced so too many of them since his life sentence here had begun all those…

… all those…

… how long had he been down here? Had he really been imprisoned beneath the earth so long that he'd actually forgotten when he'd arrived? Had the King really managed to make them feel as though each hallucination was as fresh and painful as his very first?

Pinhead sighed, and once again tried to imagine he was somewhere else.

As always, it didn't work: the _real_ nightmare never gave him a chance to escape.

* * *

There was only one man in all of Oz and beyond who'd had the slightest clue where the shockwave had come from and what it signified. Of course, it wasn't as if the Nome King was actually in a position to spoil the surprise.

True, he could have dampened the energies of the shockwave, prevented anyone from even feeling the magic that the portal had unleashed; but after so many years of waiting, he couldn't resist letting this miniscule glimpse of the future reach the minds of his enemies.

It was, he decided, a herald.

… a sign of the ending still to come.

Soon, Dorothy Gale would be led through the portal and back into Oz; she'd follow the clues that had been left for her, travelling across the ruined country and into the Emerald City, where Mombi would keep her in captivity until all the components of the ritual were assembled. Then, it would be a simple but delicate matter of persuading Dorothy to take part in it- of her own free will; once it was finished, the King would be human, and the reality-distorting powers of the artefacts would belong to him.

Of course, if the ritual failed, or Dorothy simply refused to take part in it… well, there were two very capable witches in the area that could provide the transformation. Glinda had already agreed to help, although it might still be several weeks before she'd finished translating the spell. Once she arrived at the palace, Elphaba could definitely provide the spell without having to waste time translating, but it would be very difficult to persuade her to do so.

Difficult- but not impossible.

And from there, who could know what would happen? Even the King couldn't guess at exactly what he'd do with the power he'd obtain, beyond a few basic ideas for the future of his fellow Nomes.

One thing was certain, however: Oz would no longer exist.

It would be expunged from history itself, the foul and corrupt society that had festered at its heart purged and forgotten by all; the crime that it's people had dared to commit against Nomekind would never have happened, the perpetrators of the deed would never have been born. The land itself, forests, mountains, ruins and all, would be rolled up like a carpet and flung into oblivion.

And at long last… his mistake would die with it.

* * *

Next chapter- The Attack On The Nome Dominions!


	22. Bombardier's Wrath

A/N: I'm really sorry about the delay, ladies and gentlemen- I've been swamped with every single kind of inconvenience possible; work, homework, exams, errands, a hangover, and so on and so forth. I'll do my best to keep a tighter schedule from now on. Once again, I apologise for the delay, and thank you for your reviews. In the meantime, read and review, ladies and gents, read and review and enjoy!

Disclaimer: I don't own Wicked, Return to Oz, the Wizard of Oz, or anything else of Oz. So there.

* * *

Elphaba's attempt to study the energies that had swept through the camp had proved, by large, almost completely pointless: she hadn't been able to determine who had cast the spell, where it had been cast from, or even what it had been cast upon. In fact, the only thing she'd learned was that the spell itself had been some kind of teleportation or gateway spell- obviously a very powerful one if it had caused such a shockwave- but that was it. Irritated, she'd decided not to go back to bed; instead, she fetched another blanket and sat down in front of the fire to think on the battle plan for next morning.

It took less than five minutes to doze off; she awoke after what felt like half a millennium, the sound of Curter's voice ringing in her ears.

"Elphaba!"

"Mmmmph. Whzst?"

"It's nine o'clock."

"Hm. G'dmrnnnng."

"We're supposed to be leaving at ten-thirty."

Elphaba shot upright, furiously untangling herself from her blankets. "Have the preparations started already?" she yelped.

"Relax, we've barely finished eating breakfast," Curter soothed. "You can take a little time to get dressed, maybe even have a wash in the stream if you like."

"Curter, I've been sleeping in my clothes for the last two days; the only things keeping me from smelling even worse than I already do are a few spells and everything else I have on my mind at the moment. Besides," she added, hurriedly disassembling her unoccupied tent with a wave of her hand, "I didn't pack a change of clothes, or any towels for that matter, so let's just get down to business: where are we prepping the carpets?"

"Just by the Big Nome's left leg- wait! _Wait!_ Could you at least have some breakfast first?"

"No time for that! I've got work to do! I've got the runic plates to set up, I've got ancillary spells to add to the carpets, and I can't afford to stand around eating roast pigeon while the deadline slips through our fingers!"

"Elphaba, we've still got an hour," Curter wheedled. "It's not so urgent that you can't sit down for a few minutes and eat something. Besides, if this is going to be the day we actually attack the Nomes, you're going to need to keep up your strength, so don't you think you could at least spare ten minutes? Five? Two, even-"

"Alright, alright," Elphaba grumbled. "Five minutes, and then we need to get moving."

The morning campfire was still smouldering, so it didn't take much magic to get it up to cooking temperature again; once her leg of Unidentifiable Scavenger Bird was hot enough to be edible, Elphaba sat down to eat it… and Curter took the opportunity to start asking questions.

"So, who's waiting for you?"

"I'm sorry, what?"

"You told me that you'd be leaving Oz once this whole grisly business is over and done with- and you also said that you wouldn't be spending the rest of your life alone and hated, either. So, who's waiting for you?"

Elphaba sighed deeply, and briefly considered changing the subject; why bother, though? She'd been pretty determined to hand over all of her secrets yesterday, so why stop now?

"Fiyero," she answered flatly.

Curter blinked. "So… he didn't die?" he said uncertainly.

"Far from it; he's been living with me in the lands beyond Oz for the last year. There's only one problem, though: he was captured and imprisoned by the Nomes when they invaded Oz- after he was invited back to the Emerald City for his own coronation."

For the next ten seconds, there was silence, broken only by the sound of Curter's jaw flapping aimlessly as he tried to organise a coherent sentence. "He's… the _Scarecrow?"_ he gibbered at last.

"My attempt to save him from his torturers went a bit awry," Elphaba explained sadly. "In fact, it went so badly, I thought I'd actually killed him until he finally revealed himself, on that night at Kiamo Ko. And, in the end, he was the one who came up with the idea of faking my death. By the way, you might want to close your mouth- there's flies about."

"Fair enough," said Curter blearily. "I've heard a lot of strange things in my life, Elphaba, but I don't think any of them were half as bizarre as the things you've seen and done. I mean, how did you even stay sane? How did you carry on for so long without losing hope?"

"More often than not, I didn't; towards the end, I almost lost my grip on reality. And in the end, there were two things that helped me back from the precipice. Can you guess what they were?"

"Fiyero and Glinda." The Munchkin artilleryman wearily pinched the bridge of his nose. "No wonder you got sarcastic when I started trying to convert you, I mean-"

"Curter…"

"- I must have looked like such an idiot, or worse, just like the kind of cleric who'd-"

"Look, you don't need to start chastising yourself now, of all times; besides, if you're worried about coming off as a self-righteous overbearing zealot, well, you've certainly made a better case for yourself than all the other unionists I've met in my lifetime. And most of the Ozians, too, incidentally, but that seems to be the case for most of our little band of guerrillas."

There was an awkward pause, as the two of them considered this.

"Is there anyone waiting for_ you_?" Elphaba asked hesitantly.

For a moment, Curter's face looked downcast. Then, he smiled- a rather forced smile, but a smile nonetheless. "It's not important," he said quietly. "Besides, we've got a war to fight and a nation to bring back from the dead; we can't really afford to start getting melancholy now, can we?"

And that was all he'd say on the subject. In fact, it was all that he said for the next few minutes, until Elphaba finished her breakfast and the two of them finally began the slow march around the decaying bulk of the Behemoth Nome towards the Flying Carpets.

* * *

"Are you sure this is safe?"

"I don't know," said Elphaba, bluntly. "I've never tried to harness a quartet of hundred-pound rune plates to the bottom of a flying carpet. I mean, the ropes look tight enough, but there's always the chance of the knots slipping loose at high speed. The good news is that we're just about invulnerable to enemy attack, so long as we keep these rune plates held tightly against the carpet."

Rasp's face suddenly turned concrete grey. "Gnoll?" he called. "Could you double-harness those rune plates? Just to be on the safe side. Lots and lots of knots, if you please."

By now, the preparations were almost complete: all eight of the runic plates had been tied to the bottom of the two carpets, and the refugees were testing their strength as best as they could without wasting precious ammo. Meanwhile, Woolwax was drilling the bombardiers once again, this time using launchers that Elphaba and Curter had modified; these adapted weapons fired with more accuracy and less recoil, and the ammunition that Elphaba had been able to magically enhance now exploded with more devastating results: during initial tests on the giant Nome's corpse, a full half of the monster's left arm had been blasted into powder by just one exploding shell.

They were also clear on the plan: from what Elphaba had been able to see through her crystal ball, the Nome Dominions were largely comprised of colossal mountains and vast plateaus, with all Nome settlements presumably hidden deep beneath the ground, which the crystal ball's ethereal eye could not penetrate. However, the surface was regularly patrolled by Nome warriors. So, the plan was to enter the Dominions, open fire on any soldiers within range, and flee before they had the time to organize a counterattack; the next day, they would attack again with a similar strategy, but this time in a different region of Nome territory. If all went well, the refugees would continue this guerrilla warfare for as long as possible, using whatever weapons they could find (including magic) to attack the area and broadcast their demands, until the Nome leaders finally agreed to negotiate.

And oddly enough, there was a curious sense of optimism as the refugees went about their work, training, building, and modifying: Elphaba had actually seen a few of them smiling at her- before they'd realised what they were doing, of course. Nobody could quite fathom why they all seemed so happy: maybe it was the fact they had a developed plan to work to, maybe it was the fact that they were almost prepared for the ordeal ahead of them. And maybe, _just maybe,_ it was because they weren't really refugees anymore.

They were freedom fighters.

Guerrillas.

Or, as the official name still went, they were Bombardiers.

As the newly-christened freedom fighters slowly began clambering aboard the flying carpets, supplies and all, Elphaba couldn't help but grin with barely-concealed delight, for she'd just found herself at one of those impossibly rare moments in her life where the pessimistic voice in the back of her head had absolutely nothing to say; now, she felt only a mad and glorious sense of enthusiasm.

Soon, Fiyero and Glinda would be within their reach.

* * *

"Would anyone mind telling me just who the hell this Pinhead guy is?"

Fiyero knew that it wasn't likely that anyone would actually answer the question, and truth to be told, he wasn't sure he wanted to know just who was languishing in the cell next-door; in all likelihood, the answers would either be depressing, horrific, or just plain boring. But by now, Fiyero had well and truly run out of things to do: he'd thought of every possible way he could escape, be rescued, or be executed; he'd imagined what he _could_ have been doing today had the Nome King not invaded, including the things that involved Elphaba and a palace room with a permanent Do Not Disturb sign on the door; he'd forced himself to sleep, just long enough to stave off boredom for an hour or two; he'd hummed, he'd whistled, he'd sang, and he'd even made a few blatantly futile attempts to check for weak points in the walls and floor. And now, with nothing left to do with his copious free time, he'd fallen back on the question of Pinhead's identity; and because he'd exhausted the answers to that particular question, he was now shouting it fruitlessly at the wall.

"Come on! How important is this guy supposed to be, anyway? Are you worried I might try to break him out if I knew who he was? I'm not exactly a security risk, in case you hadn't noticed; I can't kick down walls or erode solid rock with my voice… unfortunately. I mean, maybe Glinda could do something, but it's pretty obvious that I'm not her, and I don't have magical powers. You do understand that, right?"

Of course, nobody replied. If anything, the Nomes had been even quieter of late; those of them who'd actually entered the cell had simply gone about their duties and left without saying a word. Of course, they'd mainly been there to inspect Fiyero's stitching and make necessary repairs, so at the time, he hadn't been in the mood to complain. Now, though, with the silence stretching out so thin it would probably snap, Fiyero wouldn't rest until he got at least _one_ word out of the Nome staff.

"Hello up there!" he bellowed cheerily. "I don't suppose anyone actually knows who my neighbour is? I'd ask him myself, but he hasn't said a word since I got here- very rude of him, I'm sure. Does anyone know who he is and what he did to earn a sentence down here?"

There was a five-second pause, and then, to his amazement, a familiar voice said, "You were shouting about Glinda a moment ago, Your Highness?"

Fiyero turned to see Basalt's face emerging from the wall, as blank and expressionless as ever. "Nothing relevant to your job, I'm afraid," he said hesitantly.

"Apologies," Basalt intoned. "I was passing through the area and happened to hear you speaking. I will go, if I am not required-"

"Wait!" Fiyero exclaimed. He wasn't sure why he was getting so worked up over this chance to get a simple answer out a Nome, and he wasn't sure why he thought Basalt would tell him anything, but he wasn't about to let the one chance for a conversation slip away. Thankfully, Basalt dutifully reappeared in the wall, so Fiyero continued: "I was trying to get the attention of someone who might know about the prisoner in the cell next-door to me; I heard the King call him "Pinhead" but other than that, I don't know anything about him."

"You are… curious?" Basalt hazarded.

"That's right."

Basalt nodded, as if in understanding. "I know little of the other prisoners here, if there are any, but I do have the right to inspect the cell. If you would excuse me for a moment…"

He turned, and disappeared back into the wall. A minute later, he reappeared, and it might have just been Fiyero's imagination, but the Nome's otherwise expressionless face looked _ever_ so slightly confused. "The prisoner is… not visible," the Nome announced hesitantly.

Fiyero laughed. "So, the cell's empty, and Pinhead wins the award for "Anticlimax of the Year." So how did he escape?"

"You misunderstand me, Your Highness: the prisoner is absent, along with the cell in which he was imprisoned. The marker for the cell still exists, and the room itself still exists according to the floor plan, but it is no longer physically accessible; when I attempted to enter, I was redirected to the next cell."

"O-_kay _then," said Fiyero, fighting the urge to let his jaw drop. "You're sure about that? You didn't just pass through a low ceiling on the way over or anything like that?"

"Positive: I attempted to enter the room four times, each approaching from different directions, and on each occasion, I bypassed it altogether. From little I was able to determine, several powerful magical spells have been cast around and on the cell itself."

"In other words, someone enchanted it out of reality- "someone" being the Nome King."

"The King would be the only Nome in the palace with the magical strength to do so, yes," Basalt concurred.

"So, in that case, why would he go to all this trouble to hide whatever he's keeping in that cell? Who or what could be so valuable that he's willing to shift it out of existence just to keep it hidden from other Nomes? I mean, it can't be just another prisoner, can it?"

* * *

The crews of the two flying carpets were silent by the time they'd reached the Deadly Desert. Few among them had ever even glimpsed the lethal sand dunes, and Elphaba was the only one among them who'd ever been brave enough to venture across it and into the lands beyond Oz; as such, there was a curious mixture of fear and anticipation about them, a kind of pioneering spirit that hadn't been seen since before the Wizard had come to power.

Funnily enough, very few of the freedom fighters were especially worried about dissolving into sand, in spite of all the horror stories that they'd heard and told about the Deadly Desert. Maybe it was the growing sense of confidence that now seemed to surround them, or maybe it was just the fact that there were so many other things that could kill them on the horizon that the one directly beneath them didn't seem to matter. Those of them that weren't too busy loading their weapons or piloting the carpets were discussing the Nomes: "They won't _all_ have magic belts on them, right?" being the most-asked question, swiftly followed by "What do you suppose the Nomes actually want? Apart from taking over Oz and killing anything that looks at them funny, I mean."

Elphaba was quite naturally asking herself different questions: what had the Nomes been doing with Fiyero and Glinda while they'd been in captivity? What had they wanted them for in the first place? And of course, what did they want with _her?_

But then again, it wouldn't be long before she might have the chance to ask these questions to the Nomes in person: up ahead, emerging from the dunes was a line of tiny jagged rock formations, followed by another slightly larger row, and another after that. Each row of rocks was larger than the next, seemingly forming an embankment that sloped upwards into a seemingly endless plateau- a plateau that could only be the beginnings of Nome territory. The towering, double-spired mountain far beyond just about guaranteed it.

At the front of the lead carpet, Rasp was quivering in excitement- or terror; his expression lay somewhere between a grin and a hysterical rictus, and he was clutching his rocket launcher so tightly it looked as though he might leave dents in the outer casing. Javelin was sitting next to him, muttering something in his ear; Elphaba caught a whisper of "look on the bright side, the worst they can do is kill us," before they both looked up to see her edging towards them.

"It might be time to get ready for battle," she called. "I saw Nome guards patrolling less than three hundred feet into that plateau."

"Really? Oh dear, and I here's me without my regulation brown-rubber trousers."

"Would you relax? We'll be fine as long as we stick to the plan of attack: fly in-"

"- find a target, attack, leave a message, and get the hell out before someone kills us; I know the plan, I've been discussing it with you on and off for the past two hours of flight. I'm not scared, believe it or not; I just wish that I could stop myself from thinking about everything that could possibly go wrong."

"If it's any help, then you probably won't be thinking that when the fighting starts."

"True enough. I'll be too busy trying to force my intestines back down my throat." He turned to the gaggle of people behind him. "Okay, ladies and gentlemen; we're almost there, so we need weapons out on the double, ready to fire on my order. Chop-chop, everybody!"

Over the clatter of weapons being readied, he turned to the neighbouring carpet, and signalled. There was a deafening roar of "LADIES AND GENTS, IT'S TIME TO KIIIIIIILL!" from Woolwax, and the crew immediately began loading their launchers.

"Here's hoping we don't have to go too far into the territories to find a patrol," Rasp muttered. "I'd rather not find out just how fast real Nomes can move."

* * *

Not for the first time that week, Border Guard Raggavom was on the verge of losing his temper. Anger was perfectly normal for a guard and downright useful when appropriately directed; but with no fleshlings about, and with nothing else to do but listen to his underlings talk amongst themselves, Raggavom was at his wit's end.

He'd been perfectly happy with assigned job in the Upper Caverns Security Police, arresting renegades and removing undesirables from their positions, and enjoying the privileges of anger and pride that he accumulated with every promotion; he'd found it strange that so many of the offenders had been far more qualified for the work than the War Council-approved replacements, but otherwise, he'd had no complaints… up until last week, when a council representative had knocked on the door and told him that he was being reassigned.

The little coprolite had informed him that he was in "a key position to positively direct the thinking of an otherwise irreplaceable group leader" but that he was "regrettably unqualified to fill this role." As such, he would be "provided with suitable work in accordance with all known specialities and talents," which meant that he was given the job of a lieutenant in the border patrol and promptly frogmarched to the very edge of the Nome Dominions- specifically, the "area of least concern" edge, where nothing ever happened and nobody ever invaded- and given authority over a team of unprivileged Nomes who probably couldn't tell the difference between their fingers and their fists.

But in all honesty, it wouldn't have been so bad if he'd only been a sergeant. After all, they didn't have to put up with boredom.

Lieutenants, intended to be always on the lookout for new assignments and new offenders, were given the privilege of boredom: with no new assignments and next to no offenders out here in the fringes, and nothing new to see above or belowground, Raggavom was on the brink of insanity. And as recent as yesterday evening, someone in the upper echelons of Nome Society had made it their mission in life to drive him _over_ the brink: every hour, orders would arrive by courier, directing his patrol further to the south- and the orders were always marked with the Royal Seal, so he _had_ to obey, and when he did, he'd immediately receive a message from the local War Council representative demanding to know what the hell he was doing.

Around the time that his patrol came within five miles of the Deadly Desert, Raggavom was beginning to think that he'd be lucky to get through the week without hitting someone and losing what little rank he had left.

Then the corporal next to him exploded.

Wheeling around on the spot, he scanned the landscape for attackers, and found all three of them hovering in the sky two hundred feet above him: two rectangle-shaped platforms, and a smaller, streamlined dart-shape. He'd barely enough time to recognise the blurry figures standing on the platforms as humans, before another explosion tore clean through his patrol, shattering two of the four remaining Nomes to gravel.

_It's just one thing after another, isn't it?_

Pausing only to cast the only spell he'd ever been taught- a signal to alert the nearest guardhouse of trouble- Raggavom dived beneath the earth without looking back, hoping against hope that the rest of his patrol would be too stupid to follow him.

As he sped off through the bedrock, he heard the muted roar of approaching Nomes, and looked up to see an entire platoon of warriors hurrying through the earth towards the surface. Raggavom could tell that these weren't detachments from the guardhouse: no fringe base had warriors of this type in reserve, and even if there were a few squads of elites hidden away in _his_ barracks, none of them would be here- it was far too soon for anyone to be responding to his signal. No, these Nomes had been waiting for something like this to happen.

_But how'd they know those humans would attack the patrol? How could they have known that I'd be in the area when they-_

The orders.

Every single order he'd received from the Palace had been redirecting him into the path of the invaders… as bait.

* * *

The reinforcements arrived less than ten seconds later: the earth itself appeared to bubble and warp as dozens upon dozens of Nome soldiers began _pouring_ out onto the plateau, quickly lining up in a formation too widely spread to be wiped out with a single rocket- a formation that neatly cut off any escape that the freedom fighters might attempt.

True, the Nomes might not be able to reach or outpace the carpets, but every single one of them was armed with a long silver spear, viciously barbed at the tip and almost incandescent with magic; doubly worrying, the soldiers were flanked by smaller Nomes almost weighed down with replacement spears. Even at this distance, Elphaba could clearly see that these already deadly-looking weapons had been built to explode the moment they came within inches of human flesh.

There was a long pause, as the warriors prepared to launch their spears, priming the enchantments and aiming carefully; they were counting on indecision and fear to keep their targets still- and it was working. Eventually, a spokesperson from among the unit began demanding that the "human invaders" surrender immediately or die.

Far above them, Elphaba and Rasp exchanged glances.

"Do you think we'll make it through _this?"_ Rasp asked quietly.

Elphaba offered her most reassuring smile. "Did you think we stood much of a chance in yesterday's fight?"

"In a word, no."

"But we survived that, and it wasn't because we fled or retreated, either. The odds we have to beat today aren't nearly as high- not while we're got those rune plates."

"Assuming they work against those damn spears." Rasp sighed. "In the event that we don't survive this, I'd just like to say that it's been a pleasure working with you, Elphaba."

"You too, Quintether."

There was an even longer silence, as the flow of demands from the Nome spokesperson finally ground to a halt. Then, Rasp took a deep breath and bellowed, "FIRE AT WILL!"

As Elphaba kicked off and began accelerating towards the waiting ranks of Nome warriors, she saw the final millisecond before the bombardiers on both carpets opened fire play out as if in slow motion: she saw Rasp readying the fuse on a grenade, hands shaking almost uncontrollably; she saw Woolwax repeating the order to fire, his mouth open so wide that Elphaba could see his tonsils even from this distance; she saw individual bombardiers yelling warcries of their own as their fingers clenched down on the triggers; she saw Brollan and Moleburr both changing course, obviously trying to keep the rune-plated base of the carpet angled towards the Nomes; and finally, she saw Javelin, clinging to the edge of the carpet with his teeth.

And then the bombardiers let fly.

If the spokesperson had anything to say about this, it was lost in the ear-pummelling boom that rang out across the plateau as the first salvo hit the Nome warriors head on. Whole sections of the regiment below simply _vanished _into sprays of gravel, or else were flung headlong across the battlefield by massed explosions, losing limbs and huge chunks of torso in the process; as these particularly unlucky survivors began pulling themselves back together again, the Nomes which had escaped the blasts altogether now launched their spears as one: a hail of deadly missiles tore through the air towards the carpets, each spear exploding with bone-pulverising force.

Thankfully, Brollan and Moleburr had been quite adept at manoeuvring the carpets in the meantime, and most of the enemy's fire impacted upon their undercarriages: the shockwaves of exploding spears rocked and shook the carpets, almost bucking several of the crew out of their seats, but the magic of the rune plates shielded them from the worst of the attack.

Then, as the bombardiers hurried to reload and the Nome warriors began reaching for their next spears, Elphaba rocketed out of the blue at a speed that made the air burn, and with a wave of her hand, sent a wave of coruscating magical power sweeping into the few enemy formations who hadn't been hit by the opening salvo. In the cascade of vividly multi-coloured explosions that followed, Nomes caught in the blasts were utterly disintegrated, or else flung headlong across the battlefield with murderous force as the shockwaves of the explosions rippled outwards. Swooping away from the carnage, Elphaba let out an earsplitting shriek of triumphant laughter.

"Still worried, Governor?" she shouted, as the carpet swept past her.

"Not in the slightest!" Rasp yelled back: he was grinning compulsively by now, and readying to launch another grenade. "BOMBARDIERS," he shouted at the top of his voice, "FIRE AGAIN! FOR THE SCARECROW! FOR GLINDA! AND FOR OZ!"

"FOR OZ!" the bombardiers roared back, and opened fire.

This time, the Nomes below were no longer interested in keeping formation, and many of the intended targets hastily retreated back into the earth before the rockets hit them; fortunately, this meant that the neighbouring soldiers took the brunt of the explosions, being either shattered to pieces or riddled with debilitating shrapnel. All the same, those who survived to return fire did so with a vengeance, flinging their spears two at a time, or hurrying to attack the carpets' undefended flank before either could re-manoeuvre; some even went so far as to take every single spear their attendants could hold, bundle them together and launch them at the carpets. Elphaba clearly saw the carpets buckling under the onslaught, and moving closer, she saw one Bombardier tumbling backwards with a scream as a jagged length of shrapnel ripped clean through his shoulder.

As she swooped down to provide covering fire, Elphaba realised with a jolt of shock that the barrier she'd set up to protect her from any incoming missiles hadn't actually intercepted anything yet; a quick glance in the Nomes' direction revealed that none of them were throwing spears at her. In fact, most of them weren't even _looking_ at her. Even when her next spell tore through the ranks of soldiers, they still refused to fight back.

_So, _Elphaba thought, as she began ascending once more, _either they can't see me- which doesn't seem terribly likely- or they've been ordered not to attack me. Fair enough; Eldrect said that the Nomes would want to capture me. Question is, if _these_ Nomes aren't going to try to capture me, then who is?_

She was still thinking this when something that felt uncannily like a sledgehammer crashed into the back of her head, knocking her senseless.

The last thing she saw before she lost consciousness was an aerial view of Brollan's carpet, rushing up to meet her.

* * *

"I can't believe you did that," said Rasp flatly.

"Don't look at me like that," Brollan grumbled. "The gazelle poked me in the back again; I accelerated by mistake- nothing deliberate about it."

"I did nothing of the sort, and you know it: you actually went out of your way to catch her!"

"Would the two of you stop making such a big deal out of it? Maybe I did catch her, maybe I didn't; let's just wake her up and try to figure out what to do next."

"Like _moving_, for example?"

There was a deathly pause, as the implications trickled into the brains of everyone on board; suddenly, the distant explosions and screams of pain sounded much closer than ever before. However, when Rasp finally plucked up the courage to look out across the plain, he realised that none of the assembled Nomes were attacking them; all of the spears they threw were aimed at Moleburr's carpet.

Very slowly, Rasp looked from the wildly shaking carpet to Elphaba's unconscious body, her broomstick still clutched in her left hand. Then, he yelled as loudly as he could, "MOLEBURR! BACK TO FORMATION ALONGSIDE US, ASAP!"

It took several repeats, but eventually, Moleburr heard the shouting and pulled in alongside Rasp and the others; and as the carpet came within arm's reach of them, Rasp saw the Nomes in the distance lower their weapons.

"What the hell are they doing?" Woolwax hissed. "Why aren't they attacking?"

"Because they can't," said Rasp, a mad grinned etched on his face.

"What?"

"Do you remember what those crippled Nomes told us after the battle? They mentioned that the Nome leadership wanted Elphaba captured; as long as we keep her on one of the carpets, and as long as we keep both carpets as close together as possible, they can't return fire."

"So long as we all stay away from the edges of the carpet, you mean," said Curter airily. "Or they figure out a way to kill us without doing the same to Elphaba. Or… what was that?"

From far below them, someone was chanting the words of a spell; it wasn't an especially loud voice, but something about the incantation seemed to reach the ears of the bombardiers even from several hundred feet away. And as the casting seemed to reach a crescendo, a long, sinuous tentacle rocketed seemingly out of nowhere and wrapped thickly around Rasp's neck.

A scuffle broke out as the gaggle of refugees-turned-guerrillas tried to force the tentacle to let go, but to no avail: not only was the thing almost translucent, but it simply couldn't be touched; every hand that tried to prize it off Rasp's neck simply passed through the tentacle as if it were water.

And then, just as they were beginning to wonder if things couldn't possibly get any worse, the tentacle forked: another tentacle sprang from the side of the original and made a grab for Gnoll; it shot neatly around his midsection, and began to slowly constrict. Then both tentacles forked: now there were four of them, the two new ones quickly seeking out new victims among the panicked crowd.

Curter found himself pinned to the carpet by the eighth of the multiplying tentacles, his chest and left arm being slowly crushed as the spell-creature continued working its way around his upper body, slamming his head _hard_ against the reinforced surface of the carpet. By now, he knew that it was futile to fight back; the only way to stop this would be to wake Elphaba, but she was right in the middle of the carpet and well out of Curter's reach- and worse still, two tentacles were already gently lifting her into the air.

_Well,_ he thought blearily, _guess that leaves our revolution well and truly screwed._

However, as he lay there, head dangling over the edge and right arm weighed down with his launcher, something caught his eye.

It was the opposite end of the now sixteen-forked tentacle, reaching back towards the ground and becoming more and more transparent as it went. It ended in the massive stone hands of a Nome; judging by the ominous supernatural glow and the fact that most of the army had stood back to let him work, this was obviously a Nome magician, much like the one that had attacked them yesterday had been before its transformation.

Curter looked from the distant figure of the sorcerer to the launcher that still dangled from his fingers, and realised that he was the only one on the two carpets in a position to fight back.

But could he hit the target from this distance, with his eyesight blurring and his lungs screaming for air?

Could he aim the launcher one-handed?

Could he fire it without recoil kicking it out of his hand?

Would a single shell be enough to kill the sorcerer, or break its hold on the crew?

Did he even have a shell prepared?

If the answer to any of those questions was "no," then he, Rasp, Woolwax, Gnoll, Javelin, and every single other bombardier on the carpets would be dead in the next minute; Elphaba would be captured and put to whatever grisly purpose the Nomes had wanted her for; the people of Oz would carry on suffering; and as for future resistance, something told Curter that any other rebel groups that might emerge after their deaths would have an even lower success rate.

_Oh well. Nothing ventured, nothing gained… or suffocated. Here's hoping the unnamed God's smiling on me…_

Struggling for breath, Curter raised his launcher, took careful aim at the sorcerer below, braced himself for the pain, and fired.

The recoil was _astonishing._

More than once in his short but colourful life, Curter had gotten bored enough to wonder what getting hit by a dud shell would feel like. Now, he had some idea: he felt as though he'd been thumped in the elbow with a sledgehammer, hard enough to fold his arm backwards. This probably wasn't the case, but it was almost impossible to get a look at the results. Truth be told, all he knew at that moment was that, he hadn't dropped the launcher. On the downside, he'd probably never hold anything in his right hand ever again.

Caught between the crushing pressure against his ribcage and the fresh pain in his right arm, he barely even noticed the shell go streaking off into the distance. In fact, the first hint that he might have actually hit the target was that he could suddenly breathe again; lurching upright, wheezing and spluttering, he saw that the Nome magician was now lying on the ground, missing an arm and bellowing something presumably obscene.

The tentacles were still wrapped around the bombardiers, but they had loosened to the point that they were no longer actively throttling them; even better, the two that had been attempting to drag Elphaba away had dropped her- waking her up in the process.

"What's going on?" she gasped, sitting bolt upright.

Curter let out a yelp of pain as the tentacle coiling around his torso began tightening again, this time hard enough to make his ribs creak audibly. "This… _really_ isn't the time for explanations," he choked.

"Then give me a quick outline so I can solve the problem before anyone dies!"

"Arrrgh… we've got a sorcerer below, he's choking us to death, I just shot his arm off, and I feel as though I've just been mule-kicked in the shoulder. Now _please_ kill the son of a bitch before we all asphyxiate!"

"Y… you'd better get the message ready as well," Rasp panted. "I'd rather not stick around to see what happens afterwards."

"Fair enough…"

Down on the plateau, the Nome army barely had time to duck for cover as a blade of searing energy tore through the combat magician, heating his body so quickly and so devastatingly that rivulets of molten rock splattered the ground around them.

Then they all hid their eyes as a blinding flash of light erupted from the paralysed sorcerer, tearing him to pieces; for the next few seconds, the rest of the battlefield might as well have been invisible for all they were able to see of it, and by the time the light finally faded, the invaders had vanished without a trace…

… except, of course, for the message written in the sky:

THIS IS ONLY THE BEGINNING.

YOU WILL RELEASE THE PRISONERS YOU HAVE TAKEN, AND REMOVE YOUR TROOPS FROM OZ; UNTIL YOU ARE PREPARED TO FULFIL THESE TERMS, WE WILL CONTINUE OUR ATTACKS.

OZ HAS NOT BEEN CONQUERED: OZ WILL _NEVER _TRULY BE CONQUERED.

* * *

By the time Rasp and Curter had managed to explain what had happened while Elphaba had been unconscious, the Deadly Desert was just visible on the horizon.

Now that they knew that the only way to keep everyone safe from enemy fire was to keep Elphaba on-board with them, they'd kept the two carpets interlinked for the journey so far. As such, if there were any Nomes trying to follow them, they presumably wouldn't risk taking potshots at them; unfortunately, this also meant that the carpets had to move slowly and cautiously to avoid accidentally separating, meaning that dodging incoming fire was officially out of the question.

Elphaba sighed deeply, and winced as the lump on the back of her head made its presence felt again. "On the upside, at least there are still plenty of rune plates left back on the Nome corpse," she muttered. "We just need to figure out a way of mounting them on the carpet's flanks- some kind of scaffolding or something."

"What about creating a roof?" said Curter; he was still favouring his left arm, but at least he could move his right again. "It wouldn't surprise me if the Nomes figure out a way of attacking us from above the next time we attack."

"And it wouldn't surprise me if the Nomes decide to do that right now," Rasp deadpanned.

"And here I was, thinking you'd finally plucked up a bit of optimism."

"I _am_ being optimistic; I'm just being very realistic as well. We're still in Nome territory, so we're not out of the woods just yet; all the planning can wait until we're safe and sure we aren't being spied on."

There was a pause.

"You know," he added brightly, "I think that first attack went quite well, don't you?"

Someone in the middle of the carpet let out a snort of laughter which gave way to a long, draw-out cackle of mirth. It took a while for Elphaba to realise that it was her- and that people were slowly joining in.

Brollan looked back at the chortling bombardiers, and shook his head. "Moleburr," he grumbled, "Sometimes I think you and I are the only people on this team who haven't gone stark raving mad or-"

Exactly what Brollan had intended to say next was lost in a teeth-rattling boom from up ahead, as a hundred-foot section of solid rock appeared to _bend _upwards as though it was on hinges, neatly blocking the carpet's escape in the process. As Brollan and Moleburr struggled to bring the two interlinked vehicles to a halt and the bombardiers began scrambling for their weapons, the new rock formation began to grow, rising higher and higher with every second, until there was absolutely no question of what this thing was: it was a Nome, and it was by far the biggest that any of them had seen yet- and it hadn't appeared to have stopped growing yet; its massive arms were still taking shape, and already they looked as though they could easily swat the carpets out of the sky.

By the time the pilots had managed to reverse out of the thing's reach, it was five hundred feet tall, and approximately two hundred and fifty feet wide. Its head, now tipped with three crown-like spires, had also gained enough definition for Elphaba to recognise a human face amidst the crags and ledges that composed it: eyes, nose, a hint of a beard- and an eerily friendly-looking smile.

The enormous Nome cleared its throat with the sound of a thousand derailing trains, opened its colossal jaws, and said, **"YOU WISHED TO NEGOTIATE?"**

Rasp was the first of the Bombardiers to find his voice, and even then, he could only squeak "I beg your pardon?"

"**YOU RECALL LEAVING A MESSAGE IN THE SKY ABOVE THE OUTSKIRTS OF MY KINGDOM? I WOULD HOPE SO, CONSIDERING YOU WROTE IT LESS THAN TEN MINUTES AGO."**

"I…" Rasp swallowed. "I take it you're the King of the Nomes, then?"

"**AT YOUR SERVICE. AND YOU ARE QUINTETHER RASP, ACTING GOVERNOR OF MUNCHKINLAND, YES?"**

"Er, yes, that's correct…"

"**AND THE WOMAN SITTING BEHIND YOU IS ELPHABA THROPP, FORMERLY KNOWN AS THE WICKED WITCH OF THE WEST, YES?"**

Elphaba glared up at the huge face overhead. "I'm hardly surprised that you know about us; we caught one of your spies in the act already, remember?"

"**GUILTY AS CHARGED."**

"Then what did you want with me? Everything I've seen and heard from your forces in the last few days suggests that you've been trying to capture me, so _why?_ What do you want?"

"**SURELY THAT CAN WAIT FOR LATER, CAN'T IT? AFTER ALL, THE ONES YOU TRAVEL WITH HAVE LEGITIMATE GRIEVANCES OF THEIR OWN- SOME OF WHICH YOU YOURSELF SHARE. AFTER ALL, YOU **_**ARE **_**HERE FOR THE SCARECROW AND GLINDA."**

"_And _for the restoration of Oz," Rasp added pointedly; Elphaba's defiance had obviously given his confidence another much-needed boost. "Those were the terms of our ultimatum, and unless you fulfil them, we will continue our attacks for as long as it takes for you to see reason and capitulate!"

The King chuckled, the sound reverberating hideously against the bombardier's eardrums.

"He's not joking, Your Majesty," Elphaba warned. "He and the others have been through hell and back over the last few days, and don't think they're not prepared to drag this out into the longest, bloodiest conflict you Nomes have ever seen."

"**PATIENCE, ELPHABA: THESE OZIANS SHALL HAVE WHAT THEY WANT- THE KING, THE CHAMPION, AND THE FATE THAT THEIR HOMELAND SO RICHLY DESERVES. YOU, OF COURSE, SHALL BE REUNITED WITH YOUR LOVER AND YOUR DEAREST FRIEND… AND PERHAPS MUCH MORE…"**

"I warn you, if you think we can't stand against-"

"**NO, ON THE CONTRARY, I CAN SEE THAT YOU AND THE REFUGEES ARE WELL-EQUIPPED. YOU HAVE WEAPONS WHICH CAN HARM NOMES, DEFENCES STRONG ENOUGH TO WITHSTAND OUR ATTACKS, VEHICLES FAST ENOUGH TO OUTPACE PURSUERS- YOU EVEN HAVE A WAY OF KEEPING MY FORCES FROM ATTACKING YOU AT ALL. IN FACT, THE ONLY DISCERNABLE VULNERABILITY IS… WELL…"**

"What?"

"**OH, IT'S BARELY WORTH MENTIONING."**

"_What?"_

"**IF YOU MUST KNOW, THOSE RUNE PLATES THAT YOU LOOTED FROM OXEN MAKE THAT CARPET ALMOST INDESTRUCTABLE SO LONG AS THEY ARE HELD TIGHTLY AGAINST ITS SURFACE. NOW, WHEN HE WAS STILL ALIVE, OXEN BONDED THE PLATES TO BOTH HIS FLESH AND HIS SOUL WITH A MIXTURE OF CONCRETE AND SPELLCRAFT, ENSURING THAT THEY TRAVELLED WITH HIM REGARDLESS OF WHAT BODY HE ASSUMED. YOU, ON THE OTHER HAND, HAVE USED ROPES."**

"What's your point?" Brollan shouted.

"**I HATE TO BELABOUR THE OBVIOUS, BUT CONCRETE IS AS STONE: HARD, UNYIELDING, AND DIFFICULT TO DESTROY WITHOUT COMPREHENSIVE HAMMERING, EXPLOSIVES, OR MAGIC. ROPE, ON THE OTHER HAND, WELL… **_**ISN'T."**_

Rasp and Elphaba were already screaming at the two pilots to get them moving again when the King made his move: at a single wave of his monumental hand, the ropes holding the rune plates to both carpets snapped with a nerve-shuddering _crack_, and in the next instant, several hundred pounds of enchanted metal went plummeting to the ground- leaving the carpets vulnerable.

"**IT HAS BEEN A PLEASURE MEETING YOU, GOVERNOR. FAREWELL."**

The Nome King waved his hand again, and sent another wave of magical force scything through the very fabric of the carpets, ripping them to shreds.

And fourteen screaming bombardiers tumbled out of the sky.

"**NOW,"** said the King pleasantly, **"YOU WANTED TO KNOW WHY I WANTED TO CAPTURE Y-"**

A small salvo of fireballs hammered into the King's face, blasting it to pieces and putting a merciful end to the conversation. Elphaba didn't wait around to see if the attack had actually killed him; having been spared the fall to the ground thanks to her broomstick- as the King had no doubt intended- she was already speeding towards the nearest of the plummeting Bombardiers.

She didn't know if she could save all of them, and she wasn't even sure how she was supposed to reach any of them in time, but she was going to give it her very best try.


	23. Red Carpet Treatment

A/N: Here we are ladies and gentlemen; the latest chapter, from disasters to revelations! I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it, and with any luck the next chapter will be up by the 25th!

Read, review, and above all, enjoy- and if you like, tell me what you think of the twist; did anyone expect it? Was the foreshadowing too blatant? Were there not enough hints? Should I have sliced the chapter in two to save on reading time? Tell me what you think, dear readers.

Disclaimer: Wicked, Oz and all associated properties do not belong to me. I only have a few OCs, and I can only hope they haven't become Mary Sues just yet.

* * *

Out on the western border of Oz, the noonday sun glared mercilessly upon the encroaching dunes of the Deadly Desert. Anywhere else in the country, under the sheltering canopy of trees, it might have been a pleasant day; here, there was no shade and no defence against the blazing sunlight- least of all the chicken coop that had appeared amidst the sands early that morning.

Scant hours ago, it had been a piece of waterlogged debris swept into a flood-bloated river, and used as a makeshift raft by the only human in the area unlucky enough to be swept away as well. Then, the Nome King's portal had dragged it out of its reality and deposited in Oz: now the chicken coop lay upright in a rapidly-evaporating pond of Kansas riverwater, within walking distance of the Ozian border.

Behind the crude wooden bars, Dorothy Gale lay fast asleep on the floor of the coop.

Next to her, a very confused hen clucked absently to herself.

And some distance away, Ozma's disembodied mind watched with no small measure of satisfaction.

She hadn't expected this last-minute improvisation to work, but it was worth it: carrying Bilina to the portal might have almost drained all her reserves of energy, but it worth it to give Dorothy a weapon against the Nomes- even if it was only a psychological one.

After all, you couldn't expect chickens to lay eggs on demand, could you?

* * *

Two shredded carpets.

Fourteen people.

And nowhere near enough time to save all of them before they hit the ground.

Elphaba, still diving towards the tumbling bodies, spat a chain of expletives and tried to focus on her options: she could definitely catch a few of the falling bombardiers by hand; magic could ensure that others didn't hit the ground at lethal velocity, but she wouldn't have the time or the range to cast it on everyone; and while there were few people hanging on to pieces of the carpets that could still fly, they wouldn't stay in the air forever.

What approach would work best? If there was more than one, in what order would they work best? Should she magically cushion the fall of the bombardiers closest to the ground, and try to catch those furthest from it? Should she speed to the ground and try to catch the bombardiers about to hit the ground with one well-placed spell? Her mind was racing through every single possible alternative even as the nanoseconds ticked by; she even considered attempting to transfigure the ground into pillows, before realising that the spell was kept exclusively in the Grimmerie.

What, then? Try to put the carpet back together? No, not enough time. Could she give the bombardiers the power to fly? No- she always made a mess of that spell when she was in a hurry. Call a flock of birds to break the fall? Not a chance in hell of working. Teleport them to the-

_Teleport!_ Of course- Elphaba could teleport herself to them! She had a spell _perfect_ for teleporting living beings, as well!

True, she was out of practice by about a year, and she wasn't able to travel very far under the spell's power, and it did produce a lot of excess heat, but it was definitely an instantaneous form of transportation- provided she didn't accidentally set her dress on fire this time. Of course, it wouldn't be enough on its own…

She gathered her concentration as tightly as possible, and then sent a quintet of spells arcing across the horizon: immediately, five of the closest plummeting refugees ground to an apparent halt in mid-air. In reality, they were still falling, only extremely slowly; it would probably take at least thirty to forty-five seconds for them to land. Hopefully, nobody would try to attack them in the meantime.

Elphaba turned to the remaining six people still falling and beyond the reach of her spell, then slammed her eyes shut, and began casting the teleport spell.

For a moment, she felt a sensation of intense heat gathering around her; then a sudden lurch of displacement; then…

BANG.

Apart from that initial jolt and the rush of heat, there was no sense that she had actually moved: one second, she was a hundred feet away from the nearest bombardier; the next, she was almost right above him, and diving closer and closer.

She took a deep breath…

…tried not to think about what would happen if she missed …

…put on an extra burst of speed…

… and with a wave of her hand and a flex of telekinetic magic, she snatched the falling Munchkin out of the air; in between settling the man onto a rudimentary seat in front of her and trying to stop the man from panicking or falling to his death, she pointed the broom in the general direction of the next free-falling bombardier and began readying another teleport spell.

"Who are you?" screamed the freshly-rescued bombardier. "What just happened? Where am I? Where are we going? Why does everything smell of brimstone?"

"Shut up and hang on!"

BANG.

This time, she emerged right next to the target- Gnoll- so thankfully, there was no need to magically catch him. Unfortunately, Gnoll was currently flapping his arms in a maddened last-ditch attempt to fly, and in no mood to be rescued.

"_Take my hand!"_ she shouted.

Gnoll gibbered something about having almost caught the first thermal for a decent glide.

"_TAKE MY HAND OR I'LL RIP YOUR ARMS OFF AND BEAT YOU TO DEATH WITH THEM," _Elphaba bellowed, as calmly as she could.

And no sooner had Gnoll obediently reached out and taken her hand…

BANG.

* * *

Quintether Rasp was beginning to wonder when his life was supposed to flash before his eyes.

After all, he'd already worked his way down the list of appropriate clichés so far without missing a single item on the agenda: he'd hung in the air a split second before falling, he'd screamed the longest possible expletive, he was now falling in a way that suggested that he was going to hit the ground face-first, and everything appeared to be moving in slow motion. So, how soon would his childhood start replaying itself? Would it be during the next few seconds of his fall, or would it only happen at the very moment of death?

_I'm going to die,_ Rasp thought absently. Obvious, really, but why did it feel so impossible? After all, in the last few days, he'd had his fair share of near-death experiences, starting with that first panicky jog through the burning hallways of the capitol while Nomes tore through the foundations and hammered the old governor's body into mince. And what about that first meeting with Elphaba, back when he'd been content to think of her as "The Wicked Witch of the West"? He'd gone into that tent knowing full well that he might just end up getting charred to a crisp. So why, after so many narrow escapes, did death seem so unlikely now that it was less than forty feet away?

More importantly, would it hurt?

Would slamming _facefirst_ into solid rock after a fall of several hundred feet hurt?

Would he even realise that he'd died before his relatives began ushering him into the light?

_Maybe I should just stop thinking about this until I've actually kicked the bucket. On the other hand, _he reflected, shutting his eyes against the wind, _there's still plenty of time to worry about what'll happen to Oz after we're all dead and Elphaba's been captured. Speaking of which, where is she?_

And then, just as he was trying to look behind him- or rather, above him- there was a thunderous explosion, and a broomstick-shaped comet slammed into his tumbling body at high speed.

"Aaaaargh!"

"Relax, it's only me!"

There was a pause, as Rasp finally stopped struggling and looked up at his rescuer. "Elphaba? How the hell did you get down here so quickly?"

"You'll find out in just a minute; now, brace yourself and try not to breathe in if you can help it!"

"Why-"

In the space of the next millisecond, the world around them disappeared behind a vaporous curtain of thick black smoke; Rasp had just enough time to catch a faint hint of sulphur about it, before he remembered Elphaba's warning and obediently shut his mouth as tightly as possible. Then, the temperature began to climb, the depths of the cloud of smoke becoming hotter and hotter until Rasp began to wonder if someone had lit a fire beneath them and was slowly roasting them to death; finally, there was a tremendous lurch that left Rasp's stomach hovering somewhere in his throat, and then-

BANG.

* * *

Far below the dissipating clouds of smoke, the Nome King watched the rescue attempt play out with no small amount of amusement; he'd known that Elphaba would try to save the refugees, and he'd suspected that she'd take a minute to destroy or disable his body before doing so, but he hadn't been expecting her go so far as to physically _catch_ individual refugees as they fell. Perhaps they'd been too far out of reach for a levitation spell; perhaps after Fiyero's accidental transformation, Elphaba didn't trust her powers at long range.

Whatever the case, it was something of a nuisance; had she tried to save them all from a distance with telekinesis or some form of gravity control, he could have simply grabbed her and put an end to this charade before it could drag on any longer.

On the other hand, rapid improvisation was becoming something of a trend this week, and this most recent setback looked to be the least taxing; all he had to do was sit back and wait for Elphaba to finish her rescue. While the King didn't doubt that the Witch could save most- if not all- of the refugees, she couldn't keep flying with four or five passengers weighing down the broomstick, and she'd have to land to retrieve those who were currently gliding to the ground. With Elphaba unwilling to abandon her allies, unable to devise another means of escape at short notice, and grounded on the very earth that he now inhabited…

"Turn, damn you, TURN!" a distant voice howled.

The King turned to see the last remaining piece of the first carpet, perhaps a thousand feet from the other refugees; it was now occupied and piloted by Brollan and Moleburr, and swerving violently as they tried to land without dying in the attempt.

Elphaba had noticed it as well, and was hurriedly casting a spell of Slowed Descent on her passengers- before unceremoniously pushing them overboard; it didn't take much guessing to determine that she was lightening the broomstick so she could perform another mid-air rescue before the piece carpet crashed. As amusing as this spectacle was, it presented something of a problem: if Elphaba managed to actually save the pilots, there was a good chance she'd save the carpet piece as well, and if luck was on her side, maybe even restore it to full functionality.

There wouldn't be enough room for _all_ of the refugees on it…

…but there might just be enough for Elphaba to cut her losses and flee the Nome Dominions with as many passengers that she and the piece of carpet could carry.

"**Unacceptable,"** the King muttered to himself. **"Simply unacceptable."**

* * *

"_Don't try manoeuvring anymore!"_ Elphaba shouted over the roar of the wind, her magically-amplified voice booming effortless across the sky. _"Just hold still until I can get to you!"_

She was about a hundred feet from the carpet-piece, which was now performing a serious of energetic loop-the-loops. Everything was going more-or-less to plan now, with the possible exception of holding a long-distance conference with Brollan.

"HOW THE MERRY HELL ARE WE SUPPOSED TO HOLD STILL WHEN THIS BATHROOM MAT IS TRYING TO BUCK US OFF?" the Gilikin entrepreneur howled.

"_Remember the first test flight? I enchanted the thing so you can't fall off no matter what direction the carpet's facing; the spells should still work!"_

"_SHOULD?_ WE'RE HOLDING ON TO A SCRAP OF CARPET THAT CAN BARELY FLY ANYMORE! HOW DO WE KNOW THAT ENCHANTMENT EVEN WORKS ANYMORE? WHAT'S TO SAY WE WON'T FALL TO OUR DEATHS THE MOMENT WE STOP TRYING TO PILOT IT?"

"_Then I'll catch you!"_

"NO OFFENCE, WITCH, BUT HOW DO WE KNOW YOU'LL GET TO US IN TIME?"

"_Trust me!"_

Brollan's reply consisted mainly of swearing, followed by a muffled shout of "what the hell is that?" almost drowned out by a growing roar from below; Elphaba looked down just in time to see a gargantuan stone hand emerging from the ground, holding a sizeable ball of flame. She barely had enough time to yell _"Start manoeuvring again!"_ before the hand tilted back and catapulted the fireball into the air, straight at the flailing carpet.

Once again, the attack wasn't intended to actually hit the target: all it needed to do was come within an appropriate blast radius and explode.

And explode it did.

The shockwave alone very nearly tore the already-tattered piece of carpet to shreds; the blinding flash of light and the gout of fire that followed didn't improve matters any. Fortunately, it wasn't enough to kill the two pilots, as they'd both been shielded by the carpet's ensorcelled undercarriage; unfortunately, it _had_ been enough to send the piece of carpet on a blazing, uncontrollable dive towards the ground.

As she hurriedly traced the course of the carpet's descent, trying to determine if she would be able to reach them in time to perform some kind of rescue, Elphaba realised that they were on a collision course with the still-floating bombardiers.

Somewhere in the pit of her stomach, a small ice-age blossomed.

Elphaba, her mind racing through every single possible option she had on hand, took a deep breath, put her head down and all but _flung _herself towards the plunging carpet, half-flying half-teleporting her way through the air.

A little voice in the back of her head informed her that there would be no way of reaching them in time; Elphaba politely told the voice to get stuffed, before starting another teleportation spell.

The world around her seemed to warp and twist out of shape with every teleport spell she cast, the heat from each successful teleportation climbing higher until she felt as though the broomstick was about to burst into flames. All the while, the voice of her own doubt refused to give her a moment's peace: _they're already dead,_ it hissed poisonously, _and you've only got yourself to blame._ On and on it went, growing louder and louder until it was all that could be heard over the wind.

But, thank all that was sane, it fell silent as she emerged from the other end of her last teleportation spell and found herself within range of the falling carpet. Scarcely pausing to take a breath, she reached out to it with all her power, ready to bring the speeding wreckage to a halt before it collided with the bombardiers; she felt it slow as her magical grip tightened...

"**My apologies, Elphaba,"** said the Nome King's voice, apparently spoken directly into her left ear.** "This may hurt a little."**

… and then, _something_ tore right through her metaphysical grasp. The backlash was immediate and painful; it surged through her hands like electricity, burning the skin and searing the flesh as it went. It stopped at her wrists, thankfully, but Elphaba could tell that she was now the proud owner of a set of third-degree burns, and she wouldn't be holding anything in quite a while.

Then, she remembered what she'd been trying to do: cursing herself, she turned back to the sky below her, hoping against hope that she wasn't too late, that she might be able to try again- but no. She could only watch in horror as the blazing carpet slammed head-on into the bombardiers, scattering them like ninepins. There were screams of pain, desperate cries for help, and- audible even at this distance- the nauseating _crack_ of breaking limbs; then, of course, the carpet finally hit the ground, only adding to the noise.

Heart pounding, Elphaba descended. This took much longer than it should have, given that she couldn't properly manoeuvre with her hands so badly burnt; by the time she had landed, the other bombardiers had finally returned to earth as well, so she hurried over to tend to the wounded.

It didn't take long to assess the casualties: three of the bombardiers were dead; two of them had suffered broken skulls and spines in the collision, and the other had actually caught fire and burned to death before she'd even landed. Meanwhile, almost all of the surviving bombardiers had been injured in some way: Gnoll had a broken leg, Curter's ribs had been badly fractured, Javelin had snapped an antler, and Rasp looked as though there wasn't an inch of him that _hadn't_ been bruised. The only one of them who'd apparently escaped unscathed was Woolwax, and that was probably because the crazed Munchkin was too stubborn to acknowledge that he'd been injured.

Less than ten feet away from the crowd of groaning bombardiers, Brollan and Molebur had hit the dirt; as Elphaba approached, she heard Brollan's voice- bleary and disoriented, but very much alive: "That," he mumbled, "Was a _doozy._ How far do you suppose we just fell, Moleburr? Five hundred feet? A thousand? I mean, it had to be at least at thousand, right?"

There was a long pause, as Brollan waited for the reply.

"I mean, I don't even know how far we just went, but… Moleburr? What's wrong?"

Elphaba's heart sank; Brollan was lying dazedly on the opposite side of the charred carpet, staring up at the sky, and thus could not see what Elphaba could as she knelt down beside Moleburr's body.

"Moleburr?" said Brollan; this time, there was a flutter of panic in his voice. He repeated his desperate query one final time, before clambering awkwardly to his feet and staggering over to where his partner had fallen.

Moleburr had been flung several feet from the carpet on impact, and was now lying face-up in the dirt, holding a pose so relaxed he might as well have been asleep, had it not been for the expression of profound surprise frozen on his face, and the bevvy of injuries that had killed him. He'd obviously landed very heavily on his chest, pulverizing his ribcage and sending shards of bone through his internal organs; puncture wounds dotting his torso also indicated that several of them had also been thrust out of his body entirely. Diagnostic spells revealed that his limbs were also broken in several places, and his joints were so badly damaged that, had he survived, he would have been incapable of moving his arms and legs for the rest of his life without prosthetic assistance. Thankfully, in all likelihood, Moleburr hadn't felt any of these injuries; at some early point between the carpet impacting the ground and his body finally tumbling to a halt, his neck had snapped very cleanly in two.

Brollan went very pale. "Oh no no no no no no no _no…"_ he whimpered. "No, no, this isn't how it's supposed to be, this isn't how it's supposed to be…" He turned to Elphaba, the old sneering tone completely absent from his voice. "You- you can help him, can't you? He's going to be fine, right? There's gotta be some spell that can heal him-"

She held up a silencing hand. "Brollan," she said as gently as she could, "He's dead; there's no spell I know of that can possibly heal him. I'm sorry, I really am-"

"But… but… he's- he's- he can't… _He's not supposed to die!_" the Gilikin shrieked, his voice on the edge of hysteria. "He's not supposed to get hurt! He's the sensible one! He's the smart one! Bad things aren't supposed to happen to him!"

Elphaba had been prepared for him to blame her; she'd been ready for the bitter recriminations and the pointed fingers and the demands of "where the hell were you?" and perhaps even the accusation that she'd planned the whole thing from the moment they'd entered Nome Territory. What she _hadn't _been expecting Brollan to do was start crying.

This was something she honestly had no idea how to deal with: never in her entire life had she been given the task of comforting someone in Brollan's situation. The nearest equivalent had been her final conversation with Glinda- and that had been a prelude to an outright lie on her part, she remembered with a fresh thrill of guilt. Elphaba hadn't the slightest clue how to comfort someone who had experienced genuine loss, and worse still, she couldn't bring herself to tell Brollan to buck up and get moving, even though their chances of improvising some kind of transport and escaping the plateau were dwindling with infuriating rapidity.

And then, with the other bombardiers hurrying over to see what was the matter and Brollan sobbing inconsolably into his dead friend's shoulder, Elphaba felt the ground beneath her tremble, and realised- as a decidedly long shadow began gently rolling over them- that it was already too late.

Two stone hands were emerging from the ground; from top to bottom, these hands were at least as high as the walls of the Emerald City, and wide enough to encompass and enclose the entire crash site. And they _were;_ slowly, the two massive hands were closing in on the group, either to imprison the bombardiers or to crush them right then and there.

Naturally, they began fleeing as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, most of them were too far away from the hands to reach any gaps before they were sealed; others were slowed down by injuries they'd sustained in the crash.

Elphaba remained standing still as the chaos played out around her; after all there was very little she could do, what with her broom lying among the dead bombardiers and next to no idea of what she would do if she could reach it in time: after all, could really just run and leave the others to a horrible death, or worse? And more to the point, how would she even escape? With her hands still badly burned, she couldn't even steer properly, and there was no telling if she could even get off the ground without the Nome King shooting her down again. As for using magic, trying to blast a hole through the walls looked unlikely, especially given how fast the King had healed his "injuries." And on top of all that, she was just so _tired_…

In the end, she could only stand and marvel at how badly things had gone, and occasionally suspect that she'd known all along that this debacle- from being "captured" by the refugees to leading them on this wild attempt at a rebellion- would go horribly was so immersed in her reverie that she barely noticed Javelin frantically tugging on her sleeve with his teeth, trying to get her to move. Eventually, he gave up, leapt nimbly across the plateau and through one of the last remaining gaps between the closing hands.

Brollan, on the other hand, had been one of the first to get moving- and ironically, the only other member of the troop apart from Javelin to escape. As soon as he'd seen the hands descending upon them, he'd grabbed Moleburr's corpse and began dragging it away, barely managing to hurry out of the right hand's grasp just as it came crashing down on the spot he'd been ambling across a moment ago.

Far above the hands, the King's face emerged, seemingly much larger and more imposing from the perspective of the grounded bombardiers; curiously enough, it also seemed more expressive than before, and Elphaba found this all the more disturbing. Before the crash, when the King had been at an appreciable distance from them and his face had been distorted with shadows, he'd seemed accommodating and diplomatic in every way, but that was all that could be discerned of his expression or emotions: now that they were tapped below him and straining their necks just to make eye contact, the details of his features were thrown into sharp relief, and Elphaba found herself struck by the look of satisfaction on his face.

It wasn't that he looked smug or even particularly proud; if anything, he just looked relaxed to the point of laziness. Staring up into that smiling countenance, Elphaba found herself thinking back to old Unionist oil paintings of casinos, brothels and other "dens of vice and squalor": though most of the patrons had been made to seem vaguely unhappy in some way or another, there was always _one_ dignified-looking customer sitting in the back, fresh from having availed himself to the "merchandise" and sporting the exact same look of indolent delight that the Nome King now wore.

"Well, you've won," she said grimly. "I hope you're happy."

"**Not exactly; I'm playing a much longer game by far. However,"** and here, the King addressed Rasp, **"I am prepared to treat this attack leniently- on two conditions."**

"And what conditions are those, exactly?" Rasp said wearily.

"**You leave the Nome Dominions immediately, never to return; I will provide transportation, but you must leave Elphaba behind. As you probably already know, I have business with her- business that has waited far too long already."**

"So you want us to go back to what's left of our homes and die of malnutrition or exposure or Oz only knows what could happen-"

"_And _leave Elphaba to whatever tortures you've been planning?" added Curter.

"_And _while you live the high life on everything you stole from Oz?" Elphaba chimed in.

"_And _while you keep Glinda and the King locked away?" Woolwax bellowed.

Rasp coughed loudly. "I think we've made the point abundantly clear; the deal- if you can call it that- is just a little too lopsided for us to agree to."

"**Whoever said that Oz would stay ruined and desolate forever, or that my prisoners would remain incarcerated for life? I certainly didn't. In fact, the work I have for Elphaba concerns the first of these concerns; she will be helping to provide a future for the Land of Oz… and much, much more."**

"What's _that_ supposed to mean?"

"**That,** **my dear Governor, would be spoiling the surprise. The important thing is that I'm offering you a choice of how you can spend the last days before **_**everything changes:**_** you can spend it in Oz, alongside your friends and loved ones, with all the necessary supplies I can grant you… or you can spend it alone and imprisoned for crimes against the Nome Dominions."** The King paused for effect. **"What do you think?"**

"You haven't exactly given us much reason to trust you."

"**True. But then again, the same could be said of you and **_**you might want to put that down, Curter."**_

The launcher clattered noisily to the ground.

"**Thank you. Anyway, as I was saying, the same could be said of you and your constituents, Governor; after all, it's not as if all you're willing to give up so soon, is it?"**

"Well, yes. But we've got twice as much to lose, in case you haven't noticed: if we betray you, the worst you'll get out of it are a few craters, and we might just escape; if you betray _us,_ we're dead. More to the point, we don't even know what you're going to do to Elphaba. I think we're going to need a bit more than just your word for this bargain to work out."

"**In that case…"**

Overhead, the King's cliff-like brow furrowed with effort: hundreds of feet below, a massive hole appeared in the ground at the bombardiers' feet, growing steadily deeper by the second. As it continued deepening, Elphaba could see stairs forming in the wall of the pit, slowly leading off into the dark caverns below. **"This tunnel goes as far as the Governor's Mansion,"** said the King. **"You'll find the promised supplies at the bottom of those stairs: food, water, medicine, everything you'll need for the next week or so. You'll also find automatic transportation that will carry you to the opposite end of the tunnel, which will close as soon as you've reached the mansion. Other than that, the only thing I can suggest is that you avoid walking."**

After some prodding from Rasp, Gnoll hobbled down the stairs to check that everything promised had been provided; minutes later, he limped back up, reporting that four crates of provisions were waiting at the bottom, along with a "trackless tram car."

"**I have upheld my end of the bargain, Governor. Now, you must uphold yours."**

"But we can't just leave Elphaba here, she's-"

"Yes, you can," said Elphaba softly.

"Have you gone completely mad?" Rasp exploded. "With the carpets wrecked and the explosives gone, we don't stand a chance of winning without you!"

"We've already lost, Rasp. If you keep fighting now, you'll all die."

"Are you seriously thinking of _trusting_ this bastard?"

Elphaba laughed mirthlessly. "In a word, no; there's a good chance that he'll just cave in the tunnel and crush you all to death. But if you try and fight him, he really _will_ kill you."

"But what about you? There's no telling what he'll-"

"Just _go,_ Rasp. Please. Try and eke out some kind of life back in Oz, rebuild the country if you like- you're the Governor, after all; just don't waste your life on a lost cause."

For a moment, Rasp looked as though he might argue. Then, he seemed to sag. "Alright," he sighed. "Come on, everyone. We're going."

"_I'm _not!" shouted an indignant voice.

As the King's eyes focussed on the commotion, Elphaba turned to see that it was none other than Woolwax who'd spoken. "I'm not leaving before I've done my duty to the King and Glinda the Good!" he barked. "You can lock me up if you don't like it-"

"**How very observant of you,"** said the King, dryly.

"-but I'm not leaving!"

"**How very true."**

There was a loud metallic thud, and when the dust cleared, Woolwax found himself looking out at the world through the barred window of an iron cage. **"I honestly can't tell if you're loyal beyond all rationality, or if you just want to meet your idol, but I can certainly say that you'll be in the same boat as her from now on." **The King's smile vanished, and he leaned forward to study the faces of the other bombardiers, producing a small earthquake in the process. **"Any further takers?"**

Silence followed.

"**Then it's time to go. You may say goodbye to my newest guests before you leave, if you wish."**

There was a long and decidedly awkward pause as the bombardiers exchanged farewells with the "guests." Elphaba noted with some amusement that Woolwax got the lion's share of goodbyes; in fact, there were only three people who could even look her in the face, let alone speak to her: Rasp, Gnoll and Curter. One by one, they began filing towards the staircase.

Then Curter, who'd been the last to say his goodbyes, said something that made her heart stop:

"Do you remember how you asked if there was anyone waiting for me?" he said quietly; he was holding something behind his back- something that looked suspiciously like a grenade. "Well, this should make the answer pretty obvious."

And before she could stop him, he turned and threw the grenade as hard as he could at the Nome King's face. With the King leaning in as close as possible and obviously too big and cumbersome to move out of the blast range, it caught him square in the jaw. Over the explosion, Curter shouted, _"Run, Elphaba!" _and readied another grenade.

Elphaba had barely gone ten steps before another iron cage appeared around her, cutting off her escape. As she struggled to free herself, she saw that Curter's attempt at taking another chunk out of the King's face had failed: he was now fifteen feet above the ground and rising, struggling furiously all the way. But if Curter was furious, the King was beyond enraged: the look of slothful pleasantry was gone, replaced by an almost bestial snarl.

"**How many times does it take before you learn that that approach… simply… doesn't… **_**WORK?**_**" **he roared. **"Or are you actively taking delight in wasting my precious time? You shoot Elphaba from the skies, delaying her arrival by days; you give these Ozians the weapons to become a full-fledged resistance group, dragging out the time I have to wait even further; and now you complicate what should have been over in **_**SECONDS! **_**Do you really think I wouldn't have been able to intercept your friend before she even came close to escaping? Do you think the tunnel would have stayed open without my permission? WHY ARE YOU WASTING MY TIME?"**

Curter couldn't answer; the King had stopped levitating him, and was now shaking him violently in mid-air, swinging him to and fro so quickly and so violently that it seemed a miracle his neck hadn't snapped yet.

"**ARE YOU **_**THAT**_** DESPERATE TO BE WITH YOUR GOD, CURTER? DO YOU WANT A MARTYR'S DEATH? BECAUSE I CAN GIVE IT TO YOU! I CAN GIVE YOU A DEATH YOUR EMPTY GOD WOULD LOVE YOU FOR!"**

Elphaba didn't even bother to wait for the first scream to ring out; she flung every bit of destructive magic she could at the King- anything to distract him long enough to heal Curter and teleport him as far away as she could without accidentally turning him inside out.

And then everything went wrong: the attempted barrage of magic fizzled disappointingly and collapsed; the bone-kitting spell was reduced to a long and increasingly frustrating chant with no results whatsoever; and as for the spell that could have freed Curter from the King's grasp, a vague sense of dislocation was about the only effect that Elphaba could discern.

Somehow, the Nome King had disabled her powers.

Meanwhile, Curter was no longer being telekinetically shaken and flung about; now, he was hovering twenty feet off the ground, screaming. His skin was beginning to bubble and run like hot candlewax as the very air around him burned, slowly cooking him alive; before the horrified eyes of the onlookers, his hair and clothes caught fire, reducing him to a blazing silhouette of rags and molten flesh.

Over the screams and sounds of people vomiting in horror and disgust, Elphaba discerned the familiar click of a shell being prepared, and turned to see Rasp holding Curter's launcher, about to fire at the King in a desperate and now-futile attempt to save the artilleryman's life.

"Rasp, _NO!"_ she screamed.

Too late: a solid _wall_ of telekinetic force hammered into Rasp, sending him flying; he soared for about twenty feet, slammed into the wall with a nauseating crunch of bones, and toppled to the ground.

He didn't move

Fifty seconds later, the charred remains of Curter's body slumped to a halt next to him.

There was a deathly silence, broken only by the hurricane-like sound of the Nome King breathing heavily; finally, the rage left the King's face, and he looked down at the two mangled bodies on the ground below. **"I apologise for that outburst,"** he said quietly. **"I was not intending to kill any more of you, least of all in this manner." **He sighed. **"It would seem that my temper was not the only casualty from the… never mind. You may go now; I will return the bodies to you for burial if you wish. And," **he added brightly,** "as for you, my latest guests…"**

The last thing Elphaba saw before she lost consciousness was the remaining bombardiers beginning the slow march towards the tunnel entrance; what little defiance that had remained in their stance was gone.

The revolution was dead.

* * *

Half an hour later, the spymaster emerged from the rock wall of the King's audience chamber, his wolfish grin wider than ever before.

"Your Majesty!" he exclaimed. "_She_ has returned to Oz!"

The King smiled. **"Good, good," **he purred. **"Keep an eye on her."**

At long last, the final pieces were slowly falling into place: Dorothy Gale was back in Oz, soon to be taken and prepared for her part in the ritual; Elphaba was in captivity, able- in not yet willing- to use the Grimmerie if the ritual failed; Glinda was making headway in the translation of the Grimmerie if Elphaba refused. Oh yes, it was almost ready…

He noticed that the spymaster was still hovering in the wall nearby; close examination revealed that his face had shifted into a frown of agitation.

"**Well, what's the matter? What is it?"**

"She has a…" The spymaster's face contorted with disgust and horror. "… a… _chicken_ with her!"

"**A CHICKEN?"**

* * *

After what felt like a small eternity, Elphaba awoke to find herself almost lost amidst a small ocean of blankets and pillows. She lay there for a time, happy to be sleeping in a bed that wasn't infested with fleas or mattressed with rocks; then, the events that had led her to this place hurtled back into her mind, and she sat bolt upright.

Immediately, she noticed that though she was still fully clothed- minus her cloak, hat and shoes, of course- one of her captors had healed the burns on her hands. Also, though her powers were still effectively shackled, they'd loosened just enough to allow her a few basic non-combat spells.

With this oddly courteous touch in mind, she examined the room with the aid of the brightest light she could conjure: with handheld illumination cutting neatly through the dim light, she could clearly see the smooth, unadorned stone walls that surrounded her; the only door in the entire room led to a bathroom that looked as though it had been stolen from the Emerald City, tile by tile. In spite of this noticeable lack of exits, the room was too large for it to feel claustrophobic, and apart from the bed, the only furniture in sight was a desk, a chair, and an elaborate hand-woven rug- all of which were almost certainly looted from Ozian territory.

A closer look revealed that her cloak and hat were now hanging from the chair, her shoes sitting on the floor beside it. However, her bag and broom were nowhere in sight; in all likelihood, they'd been left out on the plateau.

_They're obviously not stupid enough to give me anything magical to work with,_ she thought. _And whatever they want from me, they obviously aren't prepared to get it by torture… unless of course, this is solitary confinement. A bit too well-appointed for that, though. Maybe this is meant to be some kind of psychological experiment, and they're watching me to see how I react to long-term imprisonment. _Are _they watching me? Or _listening?

She scanned the room for Nome faces, listening for sounds of whispering or movement in the walls.

Finding nothing, Elphaba gingerly slipped out of bed… and the moment her feet touched the ground, a familiar voice whispered **"Sleep well?"**

Elphaba glanced upwards, and saw the Nome King's face, now almost human sized- peering down from the ceiling.

Immediately, she felt her anger give a fresh surge of energy: after all, this… being, this creature, whatever he was… was responsible for the deaths of thousands of people, had laid waste to Oz, had kidnapped Glinda and Fiyero, had murdered Curter and Rasp without a second thought… and now she was face to face with him and she couldn't even kill him for what he'd done. She briefly considered shouting her various demands at him, but eventually decided against it; simmering resentment would work just as well for getting the message across. Besides, she was still far too tired to get _really_ angry.

"Quite well, if you must know," she replied icily. "Can all Nomes spy on the prisoners, or is that privilege reserved for you?"

The King smirked. **"I can honestly say that you don't want to know just yet."**

"And while we're on the subject of what I want to know, what have you done with Woolwax? Where have you imprisoned Fiyero and Glinda?"

"**The three of them are quite safe here in the palace, I assure you. In fact, you can see them now, if you so desire."**

"You'd allow that?"

"**Of course; you're one of my honoured guests, not a prisoner."**

Elphaba rolled her eyes. "And I'd imagine most of your guests aren't allowed to leave the palace, either."

"**Sad but true. The restriction is for your own safety, however; my enemies outside the palace would be very quick to try and kill you if they were to learn of your presence - or my reasons for keeping you here."**

"Is that right?"

"**Oh yes. In fact, when one of them discovered Glinda's part in my plan, they actually tried to assassinate her."**

Elphaba was about to ask what Glinda's part in this plan was- and what the plan was in the first place-, when the words "tried to assassinate" took her by surprise; she was immediately struck by a small avalanche of questions regarding how badly Glinda had been hurt, what her current condition was, and how long it would take to find and kill the assassin if he wasn't already dead. Just as she was about ask one of these questions, logic pushed an override key somewhere in her brain and politely reminded her that she _had_, in fact, just been told that Glinda was working for the Nome King.

In the end, Elphaba could only mumble, _"What?"_

"**Now you know why I was so upset at Curter wasting my time. You can relax, though; she wasn't hurt."**

"First of all, I'll expect proof of that. Secondly, why would Glinda work for _you_,of all people? What did you offer her?"

"**Simple: I offered her the chance to undo your death. I promised to send her to that day when you first declared yourself an enemy of the Wizard, and join you as a fellow defector."**

Elphaba felt her stomach lurch with guilt and horror as the ramifications slowly began tumbling into her mind: had her faked death been so devastating to Glinda that she'd been willing to accept a deal from the man who'd captured her and destroyed Oz? Of course it had! And what of the months leading up to the invasion? She'd been forced to tell the world just how terrible Elphaba had been, to lie again and again and again, with nobody to confide to, nobody to truly sympathize with her, and nothing to validate her loyalty but a few law reforms and a shrine that she had to keep hidden from the rest of the world- and all the while, she'd been trying to abide by the last wishes of a friend who had effectively _abandoned her_. Wouldn't she, or anyone else in that situation, want to undo everything that had led up to it?

In that moment, Elphaba loathed herself more than she ever had in her entire life.

Eventually, she asked, "And why would Glinda even believe you?"

"**Perhaps you can ask her yourself; as I said, you're free to see her and the others right now if you wish."** The King waved a hand, and the wall in front of Elphaba seemed to erode before her eyes, revealing a long, shadowy corridor lined with glowing gemstones; close examination under better lighting showed that the receding wall was actually being drawn aside like a curtain by hundreds of minuscule stone hands. Was this a spell? Was the wall just an extension of the King's body? Or were these individual Nomes at work?

A more important question occurred, and Elphaba voiced it:

"Why are you spending so much time on me instead of just getting down to business? I mean, I seem to recall you _murdering_ two people for apparently wasting your time." Her throat tightened as she remembered Curter's final screams of agony, followed by the smell of roasting meat and burning hair, and the sound of Rasp's bones splintering. "I mean, how is this any different?"

The King had the decency to look at least partly embarrassed. **"I very much doubt explaining it will improve matters much, but consider that the delay Curter originally caused was half a week in length, and it almost got Glinda killed- **_**twice.**_** This delay can last an hour at the most… and I can imagine you can keep the casualties to a minimum."**

"Go to hell."

"**I'm sure that can wait until later. Shall we be on our way, then? Perhaps we should pay a visit to Woolwax first- he should be quite lucid now that the sedatives have worn off…"**

* * *

Rasp's return to consciousness was slow and exceptionally painful; as well as the injuries that were making their presence known as agonizingly as possible, he was also aware of a myriad of unpleasant sensations from all around him: the smell of charred flesh, the sound of the heat of the midday sun beating down on his head, and the distant rumble of Nomes moving around him.

His eyes shot open, and he was immediately dazzled by the sunlight. The walls of the Nome King's hands were gone along with the King himself, both of which had presumably retreated into the earth. Thankfully, there were no Nomes in sight.

He tried to sit up, and was immediately greeted by a screaming pain in his back, left arm, and legs; for good measure, he failed to move any further than ten inches before slumping backwards into the dirt with a grunt. He glanced down at his left arm, and realised there was a good-sized shard of bone protruding from just above his left armpit. Groaning in pain and disgust, Rasp turned his attention to his legs: he could see that the left one was broken and currently useless, but he couldn't pull up his right trouser leg to look at the damage; not only was it virtually glued down with fresh blood, but it had also been pierced from beneath by several jagged bone-shards.

Rasp turned over- sending a fresh jolt of pain through his fractured ribcage- and threw up.

Once he was certain that wasn't any blood _there_, he took a moment to get his breath back, and looked around for any kind of assistance; he found only a long stretch of bare plateau.

"Oh… shit…" he gurgled.

Except of course for Curter's smouldering body, Rasp was alone; he was injured so badly he couldn't even walk upright; his mouth was dryer than one of the old governor's speeches; the sun wasn't showing any sign of relenting any time soon; there were no towns or other settlements in crawling distance; and, on top of everything else, he was still in Nome territory.

Prognosis: he was dead.

Unless…

_The tunnel!_

Turning himself around with his right arm, he saw that the massive hole in the ground was still there; laughing hoarsely, he began clawing his way across the plateau towards the tunnel entrance, barely noticing the distance or the jabs of pain in his chest. Unfortunately, he also failed to notice that the stairs that should have been visible from just a few feet away were gone: by the time he was close enough to look again, he'd already fallen in.

As it happened, the steps were slowly folding away into a ramp, which Rasp immediately began sliding helplessly down. Thankfully, he landed on his right leg, which was rapidly going numb.

Not so thankfully, a quick look around revealed that while he'd been unconscious, the other bombardiers had taken what transport and supplies there were and left. Worse still, he found a good reason for the stairs disappearing; the hole above him was rapidly shutting.

On the upside, he was out of the sun; on the downside, he was still horribly injured, still thirsty, still out of reach of any settlements, still in Nome Territory, and now he would have to travel in stygian darkness. For good measure, the Nomes now stood a good chance of finding and killing him now that he was underground, and there was a good chance that the other end of the tunnel would have already closed by now, leaving him to suffocate when the air finally ran out.

_Oh well,_ he thought. _I'd better get moving…_

* * *

The meeting with Woolwax didn't go entirely as planned; as it happened, the crazy Munchkin had spent half of his first hour protesting his imprisonment by a bunch of "lying backstabbing murdering stone bastards", and the other half trying to punch his way through the wall of his cell with his bare hands. Eventually, he had to be restrained, then straightjacketed, and then sedated when his temper tantrum showed no signs of abating. According to the Nome attendant, around the time they'd finally given him a dose sufficient to knock him out, he'd been trying to chew his way through the wall.

So, the meeting had been cancelled, and now Elphaba was being escorted to Fiyero's cell. In spite of her concern, she was secretly relieved at this little detour; there was a very good chance Woolwax might have taken her presence, unrestrained and escorted by the Nome King, as a sign that she was now working for the enemy. The last thing she wanted now, of all times, was to have another enemy when she was pretty much surrounded by them.

In any event, the journey to Fiyero's current residence led them even deeper into the palace dungeons, where the lights on the corridor walls grew so faint that the King eventually had to conjure a light of his own. As they walked, Elphaba wondered at how Fiyero had been treated while he'd been here; unfortunately, this began leading towards thoughts of how badly he might have been treated. After all, the last time they'd been in close proximity to an Ozian ruler, he'd exploited them for all they were worth and more; who could guess at what frustrations they'd have been able to take out on him?

By the time they reached the cell door (which turned out to be a blank wall with a number embossed above it), Elphaba's stomach was churning with nerves: what condition would Fiyero be in when she found him? Would he intact? Would he even be capable of speech? What if the King had actually found some way of _killing_ him?

As she went on silently fretting, the door was slowly drawn aside: unlike her own luxurious "quarters," this cell was little more than a cavern; bare walls, no furniture, and so little lighting that there was no way of telling if the room was occupied, except for a confused mumbling noise from the corner.

Then the Nome King shone his torch into the shadows, and at last, she saw Fiyero sitting in the corner, peering past the blinding light directed at him. For a moment, they stared at each other, clearly not entirely sure if either of them were real.

Elphaba was the first to react, hurrying over and hugging Fiyero tightly around the shoulders. "You have no idea how much I missed you!" she exclaimed breathlessly, kissing him fiercely on his burlap lips.

"I might have some idea," Fiyero laughed giddily, in between kisses. "How did you get down here, Elphaba?"

There was a pause, as the two of them glanced back at the Nome King, who was still standing in the doorway, and Fiyero's overjoyed expression gently collapsed. "Oh," he said, evidently crestfallen.

"**Your sweetheart made quite an entrance,"** said the King. **"She actually led quite a sizable resistance movement into the Dominions- killed an entire regiment of my soldiers, before being captured. I can see why you fell in love with her, Your Highness."**

"A res…. You led _troops _into Nome Territory?"

"Pretty much, and I failed miserably," Elphaba sighed bitterly. "Shame too; I think we were actually getting a fairly successful guerrilla war underway before the Royal Irritation here caught us."

"I take it Roquat's been pawning off some of his so-called charms on you. He never shuts up, does he?"

(Here, the King rolled his eyes with a sound not unlike a pestle being ground inside a mortar)

"Tell me about it." A hint of the old anxiety returned to Elphaba, and she asked, "How have you been treated here? You haven't been hurt, have you?"

"Apart from being subjected to the King's endless monologues, no. What about you? What have you been up to in the last few days?"

Elphaba quickly explained. It took about ten minutes, and Fiyero spent most of it looking utterly astonished. Once she'd finished, he shook his head in amazement, and said, "You are unbelievable, you know that? You really are the most extraordinary person I've ever met in my entire life."

"Not extraordinary enough to actually succeed in rescuing you," said Elphaba bitterly.

"Don't lose heart yet; I think there might be…" Fiyero glanced over at the King, who was currently giving every impression of not listening. "There's another prisoner here," he whispered, almost inaudibly. "The King calls him "Pinhead," and nobody I've asked knows who or even what he is, but he's obviously important; the King's cut him off from the rest of the world. Even Nomes can't enter his cell. It's a very, _very_ long shot, but Pinhead might just be the key to stopping the King."

"Why? Do you think he'll be able to kill the King or something?"

"Maybe, maybe not. I was thinking that he must be really valuable to the King if he's willing to hide him out of reality just to keep him hidden; maybe you can take him hostage."

"It's a long shot, like you say… but it's all we've got."

Fiyero bit his lip. "I think your chaperone's getting curious. You'd better go, Elphaba."

"But I can't just leave you here! I might not have access to most of my powers now, but it's probably a concentration-based technique- f you come with me, I might just be able to distract the King long enough to get some more magic back and teleport you out of here-"

"Elphaba, there's nowhere safe outside; the Nomes will find me even if you send me all the way back to Oz, and they'll probably punish you for trying to help me escape. I'll be safe here, Elphaba; so far, they've only used me as bait."

"But if you stay here, he'll use you to make me cooperate!"

"Then he's got a hard job ahead of him; he can't actually kill me, and you won't give in, will you?"

Elphaba sighed deeply; she wanted to argue with him, to scream and protest until her face turned from green to blue, but she knew already that it would be futile. If there was one thing that had always been present in Fiyero's character, extending all the way back to his hedonistic days at Shiz, was selfless bravery. Elphaba wouldn't have been able to convince him to run if she had twenty-four hours to do so, let alone only one.

"I'll be back for you," she whispered. "I promise."

"I know."

Very slowly, the two of them finally parted. Elphaba was blinking away tears as she trudged towards the doorway, and so she barely noticed the look of undisguised fascination on the Nome King's face as she finally reached the corridor.

The last thing she said to Fiyero, before the walls slowly closed over the doorway was, "I love you."

His reply- if there was one- was lost in the rumble of the door shutting.

* * *

By the time the two of them reached Glinda's quarters, Elphaba was once again feeling nervous. Quite apart from the worry over what the King might have done to her old friend, she was not looking forward to once again revealing that she'd faked her death; this was something she'd been agonizing over for the past year, and even with her promise to unveil all her secrets if it would save Oz, she was still reluctant to compromise her secrets.

But the revelation that Glinda's part in the Nome King's mysterious plan had been _her_ fault had pretty much guaranteed it; within the hour, Glinda would know the secret, and the King would be short a pawn. And quite frankly, Elphaba didn't give a shit what the King would do to her in his rage, so long as none of it reached Glinda.

So, she'd rehearsed her lines down to the punctuation: angry tears, bitter recriminations, slaps in the face, the lot- if it might happen, Elphaba had prepared for it as best as she could as she ascended to the palace's upper floor.

However, as the door to the cell slowly peeled open, she immediately knew something was wrong; when Fiyero had received visitors, there'd been a few surprised mumbles from the darkness- enough to let her know that the room had been occupied.

Here, there was only silence.

Also unlike Fiyero's cell, the King had obviously gone to considerable effort to provide its single inhabitant with comfortable accommodation: not only was the cell just as spacious the one Elphaba had woken up in, but it contained similar furnishings: a king-sized bed, a finely-made chair, an ornate writing desk…

…and it was at this very desk that Glinda now sat, face down in a stack of papers

"Glinda?" Elphaba whispered.

No response.

For one horrible moment, she thought that her worst nightmares had come to pass, until she finally worked up the nerve to tremblingly approach the desk and check for a pulse.

As it turned out, Glinda was very much alive, just fast asleep. In fact, the only thing that seemed amiss was the fact that she remained asleep, even as Elphaba went about gently lifting her head to get a look at her face.

To put it lightly, Glinda looked like death warmed up: in spite of the bathroom, she obviously hadn't washed very often since her imprisonment, and the dress she wore looked crumpled enough to have been worn for days; her hair, which was now approaching "bird's nest" status, hadn't seen any of Glinda's usual legion of haircare products in days; her skin had turned pale grey, most evidently around her now-haggard face, which also bore the tell-tale dark-rimmed eyes and sunken cheeks of stress and overwork. Her fingers were covered in ink stains and blisters – one of her most common complaints back at Shiz whenever she was pressured into using a pen for any longer than five minutes. And it might have been Elphaba's imagination, but it looked as though Glinda had been losing an unhealthy amount of weight; not only were her arms and shoulders starting to look uncomfortably bony, but a tray of food had been set on the desk at some point in the last few hours, and all of it was stone cold and barely touched.

The final horror was that there was no sign that Glinda might have done this under any kind of mind control or magical influence; all of it was down to wilful self-punishment.

_What have you done to yourself, Glinda? _

_No, no… What have _I_ done?_

"Why is she still asleep?" Elphaba asked nobody in particular.

The answer hit her like a ton of bricks; it was so obvious that she cursed herself for not having anticipated it: the King was keeping her asleep with a spell, just so he could stop Glinda from hearing the truth. Enraged, she turned to the King, who was still standing in the doorway, his smile wider than ever.

"**I said you could **_**see**_** her,"** the King chuckled. **"I never actually said you could hold a conversation."**

Swearing furiously, Elphaba turned back to the desk, and tried to examine the papers strewn across it. Among the notes, she instantly recognized bits and pieces of written incantations and spells copied from the Grimmerie, all of which were being laboriously translated into modern Ozian. And beneath the pile of scribbles and diagrams, lay the Grimmerie itself. By themselves, the spells that Glinda had written didn't seem to make much sense, and she doubted none of them would make any sense until they were compiled in order, but one thing was clear.

"So this is why you wanted me here in the first place," she said. "Question is, what did you want me to cast? It's clearly a whole _series_ of spells, if all these papers are any evidence, but-"

"**All will be revealed in time,"** the King interrupted. **"Now, I think it's time we moved on; there is one more prisoner I'd like to visit before all the secrets are revealed. Now, if you'd step this way, please…"**

"Hang on a minute! You're not just going to leave her sleeping at the desk, are you?"

"**She has been content to do so for some time. And besides, when you leave, I'll just wake her up again. Is there a problem with this approach?"**

"Well, she's clearly been working for too long without sleep; I don't know if you've been giving her breaks or days off-"

"**I have."**

"But she clearly hasn't been making the most of them. She needs to sleep, and in a_ bed_, not at her desk." She reached under Glinda's arms, and awkwardly hauled her out of her chair. Elphaba was immediately struck by how _light_ her old friend felt, as she tried to lift her around the furniture towards the bed; it felt more like she was lifting a hollow porcelain replica of a human being than anything else.

Meanwhile, the King smiled accommodatingly. **"There's really no need to do that alone, Elphaba. Basalt, if you would assist our guest…"**

Elphaba opened her mouth to ask what volcanic rock had anything to do with this discussion, and then realised that there was a Nome emerging from the wall beside her. Darting away in shock, she hurriedly scanned its plain features, and realised that this was none other than the spy who she'd caught skulking around the bodies of the Nome hybrids less than a day before. The "spy" bowed low and plodded towards her, arms outstretched as if to take Glinda from Elphaba's arms.

Elphaba automatically backed away with a hiss of "Don't touch her!" She knew that the King had evidently treated Glinda well so far, and there was no reason for him to try and hurt her _now,_ but overriding gut instincts told her not to let the Nome get too close.

"She will not be harmed," the Nome spy/servant intoned dully. "I have been assigned to keep her safe."

"Oh really? So I'll just pretend that you _aren't_ working for the man who destroyed Oz, and that the last time we met, you _weren't _spying on me. Why should I trust you, let alone any other Nome in this palace?"

"**Because he saved her life,"** said the King, smugly. **"If you were wondering how your friend escaped assassination, it's because I had this young Nome acting as her bodyguard."**

"So? He did that because you _ordered_ him to; you can withdraw and rescind orders willy-nilly. For all I know, you'll order him to snap Glinda's neck if I don't agree to your demands, or torture her to get me to agree!"

"May I speak?"

Elphaba was about ready to tell Basalt to shut up, when she happened to glance in his direction and saw that the Nome was now standing perfectly still, head bowed, eyes facing the floor. She tentatively nodded; she couldn't guess as to what the Nome would say, but she might as well give him- assuming it was male- a chance to explain.

"I have spoken with Glinda many times during her imprisonment here, and she has told me a great deal about you; she speaks very highly of you, and as I found on our first meeting, very accurately as well. You told me that if I harmed Glinda in any way, you would hunt me down to the ends of the earth and kill me, and from the power you displayed then, I know for a fact that you are fully capable of doing so. And…"For a moment, Basalt hesitated, as if searching for the right words. "… I know you have very little reason to trust me, Miss Elphaba, but I promise you that she will not come to harm while in my care: it is my duty to protect her life and to attend to her needs, and I cannot be employed to mistreat or abuse her in any way. Even the King himself cannot easily relieve me of my duties- no offence intended, Your Majesty- for they are bound to me by magic. And if I were not bound as such, I am still indebted to her for granting me a name."

"Are you saying that you're friends?"

For the first time, Basalt's expressionless features registered uncertainty. "I… I do not know, Miss Elphaba. Most Nomes of my station do not have friends; I am not sure if I have the capacity to do so. All I know is that I have been given the task of safeguarding Glinda's life, even if it means sacrificing my own."

Now it was Elphaba's turn to hesitate; looking closely at the Nome bodyguard through the kind of vision that only magic could provide, she could tell that he wasn't lying about being bound to Glinda. But her suspicious wasn't quite ready to abate _just_ yet: "You said she spoke to you about me; tell me something that she told you, something that only she would know- and _not _something his royal pompousness would be able to tell you."

There was a pause, as the King gave the two of them his undivided attention.

"She has told me on many occasions that you had never cried in all the time you'd known each other. No matter how sad you were, you never shed a tear. Even when you said farewell to her in the Wizard's Palace, you never cried."

"But…" Elphaba couldn't speak; her throat was so clenched with emotion, she couldn't even enunciate her next words. Trying again, she asked, "How do I know the King didn't just…"

"**Have you ever tried to scry your way into the Emerald City, Elphaba? Whether it's by crystal ball or Nome spy, all you get is static; that rune defence network, I shouldn't wonder."**

Elphaba couldn't trust herself to speak anymore.

Instead, she wordlessly lowered Glinda's sleeping body into Basalt's outstretched arms; bowing his head in thanks, Basalt took her with surprising gentleness, lifting her easily over the furniture and into bed.

And as Basalt went about delicately covering the sleeping woman with a blanket, Elphaba knelt down by the bedside, and briefly regarded her friend's tranquil face.

Then she very gently kissed Glinda on the cheek.

"I'm sorry," she whispered.

And with that, she rose, and walked away, eyes to floor until she left the room altogether.

* * *

"**With that over and done with," **said the King,** "I have one last prisoner for you to meet before we discuss business." **

Elphaba, who still hadn't recovered her voice, gave him a look suggesting that he'd soon find himself on the receiving end of a chisel if he kept up the obfuscation, and the King immediately held up his hands in a placating gesture.** "Think of it as proof of my good intentions" **he wheedled, **"And as an opportunity."**

"An opportunity for what?"

"**That depends on your intentions: do you want answers, or just revenge? We'll see."**

"Do you want to make things any clearer," Elphaba grumbled over the sound of the door shutting, "or am I going to be left guessing until the day I die?"

"**If you insist on the former, the prisoner I'm about to introduce you to is known to me as Pinhead, and he has been in my custody for quite some time now; as for how he came to be with us, and what he was imprisoned for, I'm sure he'll be able to explain. In any event, you've been intending to meet Mr Pinhead, and not just since you got idea that he might be able to help you stop me,"** the King added smugly.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"**It doesn't matter for now. He'll be able to explain quite readily enough… but this meeting is for you and you alone; I cannot interfere in the proceedings."**

"You love this, don't you?"

"**I beg your pardon?"**

"All this mask and mystery business; you love drawing out the suspense as long as humanly possible."

"_**Nomishly**_** possible."**

"Whatever. Take me to this Pinhead if you think I really am that anxious to meet him. Come on, we don't have all day…"

* * *

Back in Glinda's cell, Basalt had heard the beginning of the conversation, and though it had been cut off by the door rumbling shut, he had caught the mention of Pinhead's cell.

Basalt wasn't stupid; he knew that there was no way that the two spies watching him would let him get within five feet of that mysterious, dimensionally-disconnected end of the palace dungeons. He _did_ have one major advantage on his side:

If the two spies saw him going anywhere he shouldn't go, they'd send off a signal to the nearest guard to apprehend him as soon as possible; however, their orders said nothing about the spies that he'd commandeered, especially given that these ones were cleared to assist him in his duties.

So, all he did was call for one of his own spies, and order it to move as quickly as possible to dungeons, and follow Elphaba into Pinhead's cell as soon as the door was opened for her; from there, the spy would observe all that was said and done, and return as soon as the two of them were finished.

Of course, if the King had been right about Elphaba wanting revenge, "finished" might just be the most appropriate word to describe what would happen to Pinhead, whoever he was.

* * *

Much to Elphaba's annoyance, "Pinhead's" cell was located right next-door to Fiyero's, which meant taking the same long slog down through the dark corridors.

It took ten minutes, and thankfully, the King decided to remain silent for most of it.

Just as well really; Elphaba was so busy wondering about this "Pinhead" character that she wouldn't have been able to listen for anything important even if she'd wanted to: who was he? Why had he been imprisoned? Who was he to Elphaba? Why had the King implied that she'd want answers- or revenge- from him?

Doubly thankfully, these questions helped pass the time until they arrived at the cell, and the door was once again slowly peeled away, revealing a long dark corridor, and beyond it, the faint gleam of magical lighting. This time, though, as the door opened, she felt the distant magic that had kept this oubliette separated from reality itself suddenly shifting and twisting in the darkness, as the Nome King reached out with all the power at his disposal, and dragged the room back towards the physical world.

_Where did you get all this magical power, Your Majesty? And why, if you've got this kind of thing at your disposal, did you have to wait for me to arrive instead of just capturing me yourself? More to the point, what do you want from me if you can do this on your own?_

"You'll find Pinhead waiting for you inside," said the King softly. "If I can offer any last-minute advice, if you really are searching for answers, I'd advise keeping an open mind. If it's revenge, well… you already know what Pinhead's guilty of."

"I doubt it."

"We'll see. On you go…"

* * *

As Elphaba disappeared into the shadows of the corridor, the Nome King quietly let his consciousness stretch past her, into the cell itself, and into the mind of its single, traumatized inhabitant.

"**And now, my dear Pinhead, it's time for the reward I promised you at the very start of your sentence beneath the earth: at long last, your torments are at an end, and I shall grant you the death you have begged for. But first, you must unveil your dirty little secret one last time. You admitted it to Glinda, you revealed it to Morrible, you confessed it to me; now, it's time to tell the sordid tale of your secret… to its **_**result.**_** I'm sure I don't need to tell you if she's real or an illusion; after all, you can make up your mind on your own, can't you?"**

The King chuckled softly.** "So,"** he purred, **"Once more… **_**with feeling."**_

* * *

Stepping out of the corridor and into the candlelit room, the first thing Elphaba noticed was the smell: the room had been cleaned very thoroughly with what could have only been a very powerful alchemical cleansing agent, and flooded with the smell of lemons and pine trees until it drowned out any offensive odours that remained. And of course, it didn't work; beneath the industrial-strength floor polishes and air fresheners, she could clearly make out the familiar smells of vomit, urine, excrement, and- of course- blood.

And judging by the freshness of the cleansing agents, a lot of the final substance had been spilled very recently. Whoever had cleaned the room had missed a few specks of it by entrance, and as Elphaba tiptoed through the door, she took the time to peer at the rust-brown stains that marred it- and realised that _these_ ones were at least a year old.

The prisoner, whoever he was, had been tortured in this very room.

Repeatedly.

The garage-sized room itself was lit by pale grey magical lights, most of which were angled away from the corners, allowing thick shadows to accumulate there and obscuring their contents; all that could be seen from her position was the outline of the ragged mattress that functioned as Mr Pinhead's bed. Meanwhile, the light had coalesced into a single, solitary spotlight projected onto the biggest piece of furniture in the room- a large wooden table. Strewn all over its pitted oak surface were papers of every possible size and description; the notes on Glinda's desk were nothing compared to this gargantuan heap.

Leafing through the pile, Elphaba found herself confronted with a series of ingenious-looking blueprints and drawings; the items they detailed ranged from the mundane to the grandiose, from the innocuous to the lethal. There were weapons, vehicles, buildings, even a few that suggested human-shaped automatons; whoever this Pinhead was, he was obviously a mechanical innovator- and he probably hadn't been given much to do with his time except create these designs.

But where _was_ he?

As if to answer her question, there was a low groan from one of the shadowy corners.

"Hello?" Elphaba whispered.

The groan dissolved into a long succession of coughs and wheezes, and ended in a low murmur of, "Oh Jesus Christ. I never thought it would be this hard just to get up…"

The voice sounded curiously familiar, but if Elphaba really had met its owner before, it was far too long ago to be recognizable. "Who are you?" she asked hesitantly.

"… Nobody."

"Look, I know you're probably badly hurt right now, but this is no time to get disagreeable; I'm here to help you, and no matter what the Nome King thinks, this isn't ending with me killing you."

"If you were here to help me, Elphaba, you'd kill me without a second thought." There was a loud grunt, and a figure slowly rose from the shadows, accompanied by the wooden thudding of a cane against the floor. "But then, I don't think you're here at all; I think you're just another illusion, brought here by the King to torment me."

"What?"

"Don't act like you don't know," Pinhead snarled. "I've seen so many faces from my past, all of them hating me, all of them taunting me; my parents, my loved ones, Melena, Madame Morrible, Glinda- all of them have been here, and all of them were here to torture me, not that the King kept his hands clean in that regard…"

Elphaba ignored the urge to remark _you're insane,_ and asked, "How long did this go on? How long have you been imprisoned?"

"A year. Please don't condescend any further, please: I know you're not Elphaba." The man began hobbling towards light, his voice growing louder and more upset with every step. "Oh, I know you can't be her. She died just a day before that year began, and I was responsible for it; my capture and torture here was my punishment, deserved so many times over. And that's why I knew he was saving you for the very last moment before my execution! Because you wanted to kill me ever since you knew what I really was, ever since the day you and I first met, and I deserved to die for everything I'd done to you since the day you were born!"

Elphaba's heart _stopped;_ at last she recognized the voice.

There was a burst of hysterical laughter that ended in a choked sob, and finally, the owner of the voice stumbled into the light.

His once-portly body had been reduced to little more than skin and bones, a skeletal frame for his tattered coat and trousers, discoloured with blood and other fluids as they were; his back was hunched, probably from torture, and his arms were long and crooked- as if they'd been broken and been allowed to heal at odd angles; he also walked with a pronounced limp, and leaned on a crooked wooden cane for support. As for the head, it was a mess of old scar tissue and badly-healed wounds, with barely enough hair to cover the cratered scalp; the face itself had been left largely untouched apart from the bloodshot eyes and the lacerated cheeks, perhaps to allow Elphaba to recognize that this was none other than the Wizard of Oz himself.

"You wanted to help me?" he screamed, tears streaming down his ashen face. "Then do it! _Kill me!"_

* * *

A/N: This chapter really shouldn't have taken as long as it did to arrive, ladies and gentlemen. It was all down to Curter's death scene, really: I'd tried it again and again and again, and I just couldn't get it completed to my satisfaction; nobody seemed to match up with anyone's characterization. Curter always came across as suicidal rather than self-sacrificing, the King came across as pointlessly sadistic, the scene itself just felt like a snuff film because the original death scene wasn't a rage-fuelled double homicide, but a carefully-calculated scene of Curter being tortured to death by having his blood replaced with sulphuric acid while being forced to relate the symptoms of his own approaching demise... I can only apologize for the delay and hope that the story is better for it.

Next chapter: The Wizard's Confession!


	24. The Great And The Terrible

A/N: Once again, sorry for the delay, ladies and gents; it's been a rotten time for writing this chapter, truth to be told, and it's already pretty difficult because of the torture scenes. I keep getting caught up in what I should depict or shouldn't depict, so naturally it takes a lot longer than it should. Hopefully, the next chapter will be up much more promptly, but given how badly my last estimate went, I'm not going to risk hastily suggesting a date I can't deliver by. In any event, I hope you enjoy this latest chapter: read, review, and above all enjoy, and tell me if you think the developments are relatively plausible.

Disclaimer: Wicked and the other standards of the Oz franchise are not owned by me.

PS: Do not look up crocodile shears; you'll thank me later.

* * *

"What are you doing here?" Elphaba asked quietly.

She had wanted to shout those words, to announce them as loudly and furiously as possible; after all, she had somehow found herself once again face to face with the Wizard himself, even though he'd apparently departed Oz a year before the invasion- the invasion _he'd_ caused, no less- and just to refine the impossibility of this moment to purest lunacy, he was now begging for her to kill him- not to spare him from torture, not for what he'd done to Oz, but for what he'd done to _her._

In the end, she was still reeling from the shock, and could only whisper the question at a volume slightly higher than that of her pounding heartbeat.

The Wizard, meanwhile, didn't appear to have heard. "Please," he begged, tears still pouring along the channels carved into his face, "There really is no point in carrying on with this charade any further: I know you're just an illusion, and I know you're only here to kill me, so please, please… just kill me." He glanced upwards at the ceiling for a minute. "Do you hear me?" he screamed, his voice suddenly hysterical again. "You promised you'd kill me, so _do it,_ goddamn you! You've wanted the satisfaction of ending my life for a year- why wait any longer?"

"**You know the rules, Pinhead,"** the King intoned.** "If you want to die, you have to give Elphaba one last reason to kill you…"**

"No! No, no, and for the last time _no! _I told you everything I knew about that, and I don't care if it's not enough for you! I am not going to give you the satisfaction of hearing that story again, and more to the point, I am not about to spill my guts to an illusion of the girl I failed-"

Elphaba calmly stepped forward and slapped the Wizard hard across the face.

"Does that feel illusory to you?" she hissed.

"You're not using that excuse again, Your Highness; I know your illusions can hurt me by now, and I know that the real Elphaba wouldn't waste time in trying to show me the difference between reality and fantasy-"

Her fist caught the Wizard in the jaw, almost knocking him over. "I've been waiting for a very long time to do something like that," Elphaba said, a little surprised at how cold her voice sounded. "And believe me, I'd be tempted to do a lot more if you were in better condition. Incidentally, I _would _waste time showing you the difference between reality and fantasy, because in the real world, you've got a lot to answer for: the oppression and slavery of the Animals, the brainwashing- and don't think for a second that I've forgotten what happened to Doctor Dillamond, either-, the lies, the propaganda, the worship of yourself, the assassination of my sister, and stealing a neighbouring country's national treasure- giving the Nomes good cause to invade the country _you_ abandoned, by the way. Now, after all that, I doubt hearing the so-called worst of your secrets would make me think any less of you at this point. But first thing's first: how the hell did you get here?"

The Wizard hesitated. Then, he offered a weak, mirthless stutter of laughter. "You're giving yourself away too easily, Your Majesty; if she were real, she wouldn't know anything about my part in the invasion-"

"Do _not_ make me hit you again," Elphaba snapped tersely. "If you must know, Madame Morrible told me all about the invasion after she escaped from prison, including how you were responsible. Oh, and I think it's worth mentioning that she told me this just a few hours before she died from injuries she sustained in trying to escape that same invasion… and of course, after several hundred _thousand_ Ozians were killed or petrified during it. Now, my week wasn't nearly as bad as theirs or the thousands of refugees that have been scattered across Oz, of course: I only came to this desolate crater of a country to rescue Glinda and perhaps to save Oz while I was about it, and ended up being shot down, blown up, battered, burnt, exposed to the charming attitudes of your former citizens, and captured by the Nome King; I sure as hell didn't endure any of it for you. In fact, I'd very much like to get the hell out of here so I can get around to whatever this sanctimonious despot captured me for. So would you please tell me how you got here?"

"… but… you were melted! Everyone saw you die!"

Elphaba let out a snarl of frustration. "How many times a week do I have to admit this? I faked it: I took advantage of a rumour that everyone believed; I arranged the bucket of water, and I gave everyone there the chance to throw it. The moment it hit me, I lowered myself into a trapdoor and left my hat and cloak behind. End of story."

For a moment, the Wizard's face was unreadable. Then, fingers shaking, he reached out and very gently tilted Elphaba's chin up, as if to examine her face under the spotlight. As Elphaba tried to back away, she couldn't help but notice the scars running down the Wizard's arms; she wasn't entirely certain, but some of them looked suspiciously like needle marks.

"**You see?" **the King purred. **"There are some things even I can't replicate in an illusion: her eyes are too bright, too intelligent to be anything other than the real thing; the skin is warm to the touch, reacts to external stimuli; and most obviously, she has a heartbeat. No vision I've created has ever managed to approximate that."**

The Wizard was silent for a time; somewhere in those red-rimmed eyes, the faintest glimmer of hope blossomed. "You're… you're alive?" he whispered, his tone almost reverential.

"Yes," said Elphaba, gently forcing his hand away from her face. "I think we've established that by now."

In the silence that followed, an awkward smile spread across the Wizard's face. Then, he began to laugh- not the hysterical giggling he'd emitted a few minutes ago, but genuinely relieved laughter; without warning, he flung his arms around Elphaba, very nearly toppling her over.

"YOU'RE ALIVE!" he whooped.

"We've made that abundantly clear, yes. Now, I get that you're very happy to see me alive, you're a sentimental man- I get the picture; but could you please let go of me? We're not exactly friends, in case you've forgotten."

"**True enough."** There was a teasing note to the King's voice now, a sly hint that he had guessed the punchline to a joke that nobody had even noticed yet. **"Question is, does Pinhead want to explain what you are to him? Does he still want to die?"**

The gloom returned to the Wizard's face. "It's not as if I don't deserve it," he whispered.

"And what brought this on?" Elphaba demanded. "You spent the last decade or so in power without so much as a guilty twinge about what you did to the Animals; when exactly did you grow a conscience? And, for the fifth time, how the hell did you get here? Last I heard, you'd been ballooning home."

"I jumped."

"What?"

"I jumped out of the balloon." The Wizard's voice was tired, now; it hadn't quite sunk to the level of despair it had reached when Elphaba had first tiptoed into the cell, but it was getting pretty close. "I tried to kill myself… and the Nome King caught me before I hit the ground."

"And why exactly did you do that? Something tells me that you probably wouldn't commit suicide just because you lost your empire, and even if you are as sentimental as you've said, I don't understand why you'd kill yourself over _me._ Care to explain?"

The ex-dictator paused; the depression visible on his face was suddenly joined by a very complicated mixture of fear, apprehension, and… guilt?

"**You know the rules, my friend; if you want to be released from your torment, you'll have to tell her the truth."**

"I… I didn't want it to be like this."

"**How else do you think it could have been? Were you expecting joy? Fond remembrances? **_**Forgiveness?**_** After what you did, I think this was the only possible outcome. Besides, don't you think she deserves to know?"**

"I'm not saying that she doesn't, it's just that-"

"**Your cowardice is in full swing, yes. I understand. Some have the will to face their own mistakes; others ignore them for as long as possible. Well, if you're not interested in admitting the truth, I suppose we've nothing left to discuss. Elphaba, you can go if you wish."**

"Wait! WAIT! I didn't say I didn't want to explain, I just need to think about it!"

"Would someone _please_ explain what's going on?"

"**What's to think about, Pinhead? Haven't you dodged your responsibilities long enough? Or perhaps you don't think you can do justice to what happened? Perhaps… you want **_**me**_** to tell the story?"**

The Wizard was halfway through screaming in the negative, when Elphaba cut in: "Look, would one of you just tell the story? Right now, I'm on the verge of giving up and going back to my cell until someone's in the mood to talk sense."

There was a pause, and then the Wizard leaned against the table for support, ashen-faced and utterly miserable. "I tried to kill myself that day because…" he took a deep breath. "Because I learned you were my daughter."

A small, non-existent freight train clattered out of nowhere and slammed into Elphaba at full speed, messily scattering her thoughts from one end of the room to the other. Back in the real world, Elphaba stood there, gently swaying back and forth on the spot as she tried to process what she'd just been told. In the end, the only coherent response she could organise was a flat mumble of "What."

It wasn't easy to audibly pronounce the _absence_ of a question mark, but somehow, Elphaba had just managed it.

Sighing, the Wizard reached into the mountainous pile of documents left on the table. After a moment of rustling, he emerged, holding a familiar-looking bottle in his right hand. Elphaba immediately recognized it as the keepsake of her mother, lost on the day she'd faked her death; however, it took a while to realise that the Wizard was holding an almost identical bottle in his other hand.

"How?" Elphaba whispered. She couldn't bring herself to ask any other possible question.

"Before I became the Wizard, my name was Oscar Diggs- Oscar Zoroaster Phadrig Isaac Norman Henkel Emmannuel Ambroise Diggs, if you want to be specific. And I was a travelling salesman." The Wizard shook his head sadly. "I was a lot of things, really; I was a ventriloquist, a stage magician, an inventor- anything that paid the bills and got attention. But even when I was fresh off the balloon and the people of Oz were calling me a Wizard, I kept working as a salesman under an assumed name just to make ends meet; the government might have liked me, but they sure as hell weren't going to hand over the keys to the treasury just because I was from another world. All they gave me were the chemicals to make my first product." He held up the bottles by way of explanation. "Green Elixir. Technically, it wasn't supposed to _do_ anything special; it just numbs the pain, when all's said and done. I suppose chemical euphoria was the best I had to offer. Not many people wanted to buy it, though; after all, who could spare the money when the country was spiralling down the plughole?

"So, I got bored. I lost interest in making money; I started drinking my own product; I slept around; I ended up getting cosy with quite a few shady characters- government reps, down-and-out magicians, people who didn't like the monarchy too much. They were the ones who gave me the chance to seize power when the old government fell; a lot of them were convinced I really was a wizard, but a few just thought I'd be charismatic enough to hold the throne and grateful enough to protect their interests. One way or the other, they said they might have a job for me in a few months. Until then, I was kicking about in Munchkinland. And then, on the last night before my new "friends" called me to the capital… I met Melena Thropp. Her husband was away on business, she was lonely and I… exploited the situation."

"You had an affair with her," Elphaba whispered hoarsely.

The Wizard/Mr Diggs nodded, eyes downcast with shame. "We finished off a bottle of Green Elixir together that night. After that, I left and never saw her again; I didn't even think she'd have kept the bottle to remember me by- until Glinda delivered it to me a year ago. And I knew, right then, that you were my daughter."

There was a deathly silence.

"You know," said Elphaba, her voice shaking with rage, "In all my years, I never thought anyone was to blame for how I turned out; but now, you tell me that you… you got my mother drunk on a product you didn't even bother to test, and you…" She stopped, trying to steady herself. "You know, once, I actually thought you could help me! I thought you could make me normal, but all along, you were the reason I…"

"Elphaba, I'm sorry, I really am-"

"And what about my mother?" Elphaba continued, deaf to everything but the sound of her own heartbeat thundering in her ears. "What about the woman who you were happy enough to get pregnant and forget all about? Do you know what happened to her? What my father did to try and stop Nessa from turning out like me?" She laughed, a half-deranged cackle that echoed around the room and tore through the eardrums like nails on a blackboard. "You ruined hundreds of thousands of lives while you were in Oz, including the life of my mother! Why should the life of your… your _bastard_… matter in the slightest to you?"

"I told you before: I'd always wanted to be a father-"

"And you also told me that you did the best you could to treat the citizens of Oz as your children; I know, you told me. Then, of course, when you heard the truth about me, you hightailed it out of the country without even thinking twice about them. But I'm not here to talk about your failings as a leader; why, _exactly_, did my life matter so much to you once you'd learned that we were related? Was it really just because you'd missed your chance at being a father?"

"That was part of it," the Wizard/Diggs admitted. "What got to me, though was... well, you said yourself that I'd ruined so many lives, but I never got myself directly involved in any one of them. All I'd have to do was issue a command, or sign an order form if it wasn't my own idea; if someone was going to lose their job, if someone was to be executed, if someone needed to be-" and here, an utterly wretched look crossed the Wizard's face. "… Prevented from speaking out," he finished. "Most of the time, I never saw the victim's faces, never knew anything about them other than what I'd been told. They were just… names on paper. I could look at all those deaths and those torments and imagine that they'd been for the good of Oz because I couldn't put a face to any one of the names attached; and if I did see something- an Animal in the late stages of brainwashing, say- I could live with myself because… because…"

"Because you didn't think of them as people," Elphaba finished, coldly.

"Yes. But I couldn't do that with you: I _knew_ you; I'd met you in person, I'd even been grooming you for high office. I was already reluctant to order your death. But when I learned you were my daughter, I couldn't distance myself. Once all the facts started adding up, I knewthat I hadn't just ruined your life: I'd ruined it from the very beginning, and I'd kept on with it, piling misery on misery until you finally died… and from the way Glinda described it, you'd killed yourself. I couldn't bear the reality of it. So, I jumped. And that's how I came to be here."

"There's more to it than that, isn't there?" Elphaba asked, softly. She wasn't sure whether to accept what her "father" had told her just yet, but it might be worthwhile to listen- if only to hear the full story. "What happened when the King captured you? I mean, he obviously didn't know who you really were: the last time you'd met Nomes, you were hiding behind your machines, and with the rune defence network shielding the Emerald City from observation, none of them would have known that you weren't actually the Wizard."

There was a sheepish pause, and then the Wizard mumbled, "I… panicked a little."

"You panicked "a little." Could you be more specific?"

"I thought they were going to beat the answers out of me, so as soon as the King arrived to question me, I told him everything…"

* * *

"_**TELL ME WHO YOU ARE, AND WHY YOU HAVE COME ALL THE WAY TO **_**MY**_** KINGDOM, AND WHAT I CAN DO TO MAKE YOU HAPPY,"**__ the King had said._

_And it takes about five minutes for Oscar Diggs to condense the awful truth into a semi-coherent speech for the King's benefit: who he is, what the Wizard really was, and why he's here (omitting details of Elphaba and adding reassurances that he isn't here as the vanguard of an invading army). At the end of it, he's almost hyperventilating with fear, kneeling on the floor and trying not to look in any way threatening._

_There's silence as the echoes die away, and for a moment, he thinks they're going to bring the roof down on his head. _

_Then, the King emerges from the wall, no longer a great eye staring out from the depths of the mountain, but a human-sized figure of solid rock that moves with all the flexibility of a living body. Years ago, when the two rulers had first met, the King had arrived at the palace in this shape, and Diggs hadn't thought terribly much of it; this time, though, he doesn't have the luxury of hiding behind a mechanical prop, so he can tell that this new shape is at least three feet taller than him; furthermore, the King's face is slowly contorting with rage._

_Diggs is already preparing an excuse; it's true that he just tried to kill himself, but putting himself within arm's reach of the ruler he'd personally swindled isn't a method of suicide he's willing to try. So, he opens his mouth, charm and swarm polished and ready once again-_

_-and the King leans forward and strikes him hard across the face._

_Something in Diggs' jaw _cracks_ audibly,_ _and he staggers backwards, moaning in pain; he tries to speak, to at least whimper for mercy though his broken teeth, but the King hits him again, this time in the shoulder. As Diggs soars across the chamber, he absently realises that the first strike had been comparatively gentle: he can't tell if his shoulder's been dislocated or just shattered altogether- either way, it hurts._

_As he hits the ground though, the Nome King lunges at him, and suddenly the pain in his shoulder and jaw are forgotten in the wake of the beating that follows: there's no magic used here, no spells, no curses or incantations- just a long, drawn-out barrage of stone limbs crashing down upon Diggs' helpless body, shattering bones, tearing flesh and liberally coating the stone floor in blood. He can't fight back, or get to his feet; he can't beg for mercy- he's in too much pain to speak; he can't even see the King clearly enough to avoid the punches: every time he turns his head to look up from the floor, he finds himself staring into the knuckles of the next fist just before it smashes into his face, or glimpsing the King's massive feet stomping up and down on his kneecaps._

_Then, he feels the world beneath him _shift_ as vice-like fingers wrap around his left leg and hoist him into the air: then, the King begins rhythmically thrashing Diggs against the wall. For the first few swings, this is conducted in near-total silence. Then, on the eighth swing, he finally speaks; most of this speech is restricted to long, drawn out roars of hated, incoherent oaths and threats, with a few human expletives audible over the wet crunch of pulping bones and Diggs' own agonized wails. Then, the world once again gives a great heave: the King has just thrown him across the room, and Oscar barely has time to prepare for the impact before he crashes bodily into the opposite wall._

_Through eyes that feel as though they've been drained of fluid, he looks up at the approaching figure of the King: his body is now all but painted with blood, his fists pretty much dripping with it. And while his face is still a mask of hatred, the rage has departed._

_He waves a hand, and with a mixture of fear and hope, Diggs wonders if he is finally about to die._

_And no sooner has this swept through his mind when he feels his wounds slowly beginning to heal: his bones knit themselves back together, the cuts and gashes in his flesh seal, new blood forces its way into his veins._

"_**You don't deserve the luxury of a quick death,"**__ the King hissed, his voice a glacial whisper. __**"I don't even think you deserve any kind of death at all… because quite frankly, an execution wouldn't punish your crimes or make amends for what you've done to my country."**_

"_J… just kill me. You really don't stand to gain anything by keeping me here: I mean, I don't know anything important, and like you said, I'm not the Wizard anymore, so you can't hold me hostage to get back the Emeralds or anything like that."_

"_**Of course not. But then, I've harboured a great deal of resentment towards you over the course of the last few years, and you **_**did**_** end up nudging the Nome Dominions into the control of the War Council, so I'm afraid that I do stand to gain something by keeping you here: satisfaction."**_

"_Roquat, please,-"_

_The King chuckled. __**"I imagine I'm going to be hearing those words from you quite a lot in the next few days."**_

"_-I'm sorry, I'm so sorry about the Emeralds, I didn't mean to-"_

"_**Steal a national treasure? Destroy our heritage? Sabotage the leadership? That's another thing I'll probably be hearing about for a long time: all the things you **_**didn't**_** intend to do. Of course, you might as well try to put out fire with petroleum, but I won't deny you the chance to let your mouth run freely. Don't look so sad, my friend; I never said your torments would be endless."**_

"_Then… you'll kill me?"_

"_**Eventually. It may take years, but one day, I might just find it in my heart to forgive you. Or perhaps I'll get the chance to take revenge on those I hate even more than you. Either way, you'll be given a merciful execution, and whatever drove you to suicide will no longer trouble you." **__A savage grin rips the Nome King's face in half. __**"Until then, we have all the time in the world to get to know each other…"**_

* * *

_There's a short break while Diggs' room is magically shifted into an area where he won't be bothered by anyone else in the palace; Diggs spends most of it listening for the words of whatever spell the King is using, in the hope that he can use it himself- if only as a last-ditch attempt at deleting the cell with him in it. He fails, of course: if there were any incantations in this particular spell, he can't hear them, and given his lack of experience with magic, it probably wouldn't have made much difference anyway._

_After a while, someone deposits a mattress at the back of the room and drapes a few threadbare sheets over it; as an afterthought, a bucket is added to the ensemble. Presumably, this is the nearest thing Diggs is going to get to a toilet. _

_Exhausted by the events of the day and the prospect of even worse things on the horizon, Diggs lies down on the bed and sinks into a fitful sleep._

_Next morning, he awakes just in time for a bowl of porridge to materialize next to him. It's bland, but curiously filling; obviously the Nome King doesn't want him dying of starvation before the fun can begin. Without truly intending to do so, he eats the food in silence, wondering if he might have the time to sharpen the spoon into something he could cut his wrists with- at least once he's finished eating. But no: the moment he finishes, both the bowl and the spoon disappear._

_The torture begins soon afterwards. Worse still, it's nothing like yesterday's chaotic pummelling: no screaming, no shouting, no swearing, and definitely no chance of the King letting drop of blood touch him. _This_ is a very slow, careful and deliberate study of pain as applied to Oscar Diggs (formerly the Wonderful Wizard of Oz). The process lasts for about an hour, and it involves a large wooden table, twenty iron nails, a hammer, a steel ruler, and a pair of pliers._

_Diggs screams for mercy for the first minute and just screams for the remaining fifty-nine._

_The pain in his fingers and toes is excruciating, but of course, the pain doesn't stay quite so strong over time, which is probably why he's also being vigorously slapped across the face with the ruler, and occasionally thumped in the back of the kneecap with the hammer. Forty-five minutes in, the nails are finally removed. Of course, the King ironically decides to take Diggs' fingernails and toenails with them, hence the pliers._

_But the King himself hasn't moved from his place at the far end of the room: he's been operating all the instruments of torture by magic, while his gaze remains fixed on the figure he's had pinioned to the table. In spite of himself, Diggs finds himself desperately scanning that craggy old face for even the slightest hint of the blistering hatred he'd seen during yesterday's beating. It's a very vague hope, but if there's even a fraction of that berserk rage lurking in those stone eyeballs, there might a chance of the King losing his temper and killing him._

_But there's no anger to be found in his expression, not even the slightest furrow to the brow._

_And worse still, the King isn't smiling either; there's no sign that he's enjoying this, or that the sight of Diggs' torture stirs even the slightest bit of emotion in him._

_Diggs is wondering if he could try to find a way getting the King angry in some way, maybe by insulting him, when a fresh pulse of agony rushes up his arm from the fingers of his left hand, and as five brutalized fingernails go spangling off into the darkness, Diggs passes out._

_He wakes up an hour later, hurting like hell and unfortunately very much alive. For some reason, the King hasn't bothered to remove the table, though._

_The torture continues late that afternoon, scant hours after a luncheon of boiled rats; Diggs is already in considerable pain, because although the puncture wounds in his hands and feet have been healed- if only to stop him from bleeding to death- his nails are still missing; plus, his stomach is rebelling at the taste of rat. So, he manages to maintain a certain degree of bravado about the approaching torture session: after all, he's already in serious pain. What could the King possibly do to make it worse?_

_Quite a lot, actually, Diggs realizes about ten minutes later; tragically, he only comes to this realization _after_ the King has lacerated his defenceless arms with a hunting knife and forced them into a trough of salt water. Unfortunately, the damage to his arms is largely superficial, every slash of the knife directed away from the vital arteries that might have resulted in Diggs bleeding to death, so the King once again forgoes magically healing: instead, he laboriously cleans, sterilizes and dresses each wound._

_Then, apparently to stop him from trying to remove the bandages and "doing himself unnecessary harm," Diggs is manacled to his bed for the rest of the day, his head and limbs fixed in one position. Thankfully, by this time, he's actually feeling tired in spite of his injuries, so Diggs decides to take this opportunity to get some rest before the next session._

_No sooner have his eyes begun to shut when an ice-cold drop of water lands on his forehead._

_Diggs opens his eyes long enough to determine that what just landed on his face _wasn't _poisonous, acidic, or foul-smelling, and then closes them._

_Another drop splashes against the bridge of his nose._

_Grumbling in annoyance, Diggs raises an arm to wipe away the water, before remembering that his arms are still chained to the floor. Just as he's resolving to put up with this particular nuisance until it goes away, two more droplets splash against his cheeks, followed by three more on his chin; on and on, the droplets fall, sometimes fast, but never enough to accelerate into a stream, sometimes slow, but never enough to stop altogether._

_It takes him about a minute to realise that he's not going to get any sleep tonight; after all, the King wouldn't want him to sleep through the third torture session, would he?_

_At dawn, the water finally stops dripping, and the manacles finally click open; but then, Diggs is in no mood to sleep. The constant patter of water against his skull, too irregular to get used to and too cold to tolerate, has driven him to the brink of hysteria; he recalls screaming obscenities during the night, howling at anyone who might be listening to release him. But he also remembers that, at midnight or somewhere around that time, he was thinking how much he deserved this… and after that, when time grew murkier still and the line between sleep and waking blurred, that he had imagined his daughter, face twisted by sorrow and betrayal, crying out, "Nobody believed in you more than I did!"_

_His body aches after so many hours kept bolted down, his face and shoulders are cold and clammy from exposure to the water, and he's almost manic from stress, from insomnia, and from a jolt of adrenaline he probably didn't need… but, looking around the room, he suddenly knows exactly what to do._

_Despite his best efforts, Diggs isn't entirely unfamiliar with prisons and the catastrophes that can occur within; back when he was young and still learning the tricks of the circus magician's trade, he'd ended up being jailed for disturbing the peace (in other words, he'd been a bit too loud in practicing ventriloquism). While he was waiting for the managers to pay the fine, the man in the cell across from him had hanged himself with his bedsheets. Diggs didn't stay long enough to find out who the man was and why he'd killed himself, but in spite of all the hooch he'd guzzled once he was finally released later that evening, he couldn't drive away the image of the man, face grey and body hunched, dangling from a ceiling vent._

_Right now, in the present, he finds himself looking up at a point in the ceiling where the rock has visibly deformed into a pipe-shaped extrusion, partly separated from the cave roof by about a foot of distance. Better still, he has just enough bedsheets to make a rope, and he still has the table to jump from once everything is in place._

_Had he been rested and thinking clearly, Diggs might have wondered why the ceiling had taken on such an odd shape or why the King hadn't been more careful in keeping anything that could be used to commit suicide out of his reach. But now, eroded by a combination of water torture, sleep deprivation and guilt, all he can think of is of dying. By this time, he knows that there's no other way of escaping the next session, no way of persuading the King to show any kind of mercy: at least this way, his memories will never trouble him again, and if there really is an afterlife to look forward too, perhaps Elphaba will be there…_

Maybe I'll be able to make amends, somehow,_ he thinks absently, as he begins trying the knots. It's not easy, though: while the pain in his fingers is at a bearable level by now, it's not exactly improving his dexterity all that much. Eventually, though, he finally manages to tie two fairly decent knots- first in the ceiling, then in making the noose._

_Then, he steps onto the table, and begins fitting the noose around his neck. From here, he can see that the drop isn't short enough to break his neck; there isn't enough space between the ceiling and floor for that, but there is just enough to keep Diggs off the ground while he strangles to death._

_For about thirty seconds, he stands there on the edge of the table, trying to think of appropriate last words; in the end, the only thing he can think to say is "I'm sorry."_

_Then, he steps off the table._

_To his surprise, there's no jolt as the rope tightens, no sudden wrench of pressure around his throat; all he feels is the sensation of dropping- and then, nothing at all._

_Was the drop longer than he thought? Did he somehow manage to snap his neck?_

_He opens his eyes, half-expecting to find himself in another world, the gates of Paradise reluctantly swinging open to admit him (or else, the jaws of Hell lunging forward to devour him; Diggs isn't too choosy). But instead, he finds himself still in his cell, still dangling on the end of a rope._

_A quick glance at his feet shows that he's actually hovering in mid-air, too far off the ground for the rope to throttle him._

"_**It's not going to be as easy as that, my friend,"**__ says the Nome King. His voice is omnipresent now; no face protrudes from the wall, no eyes stare down from the ceiling.__** "You gave up the right to a merciful death from the moment you first took action against the Nome Dominions, and the punishment I mete out is the only way you can earn it back."**_

"_For Christ's sake," Diggs snarls, caught neatly between frustration and despair. "Are you still pretending this is _justice,_ Roquat?"_

_For the first time, the King's voice sounds oddly regretful. __**"There's no such thing as justice, Wizard: if there was, you'd be dead at Elphaba's hands, and I'd be exiled to the wilderness for allowing a coprolite like you to steal from us. No, this is not justice; it's revenge."**_

_There's a heavy sigh from overhead. __**"No more suicides, Wizard; it won't work, and it won't help. Now… let's continue."**_

* * *

_From then on, Diggs is tortured every day; there's no regularity to it, no perceivable schedule that the daily sessions work to. At times, he'll be woken up by his first session; at other times, the King will leave him be for the morning, knowing that he'll be spending the next few hours consumed with dread over the incoming torture. Sometimes, he'll be allowed a break between each session; at other times, there'll be no breaks at all, just a long, drawn-out carnival of violence and agony. It's all to keep him from getting too accustomed to the pain, to keep him from developing tolerance._

_Then again, it's not as if there's anything particularly monotonous about the torture: as the months stagger onward, Diggs is beaten, bitten, broken, crushed, slashed, stabbed, burned, frozen, electrocuted, inflamed, poisoned, throttled, and thoroughly mutilated. All manner of devices are brought out to administer the many and varied effects, some of them improvised, some taken from museum exhibits to continue the work they'd been built for all those years ago; quite a few of these devices are left in his cell even after they've been dismantled, chunks of scrap metal that accumulate under the table. Occasionally, magic will be used to great effect: fires are lit beneath his skin, water gathers inside his lungs from no discernible source, his blood courses with lightning, his bones harden into immovable stone and leave him paralysed for hours on end. On one excruciating occasion, a spell actually makes his skin _peel itself off his bones, _leaving him to stagger around his cell in agony for the next hour until his skin is finally returned_.

_But he truly dreads the days when the King arrives with a cage or a tank in his hands, and something inside it wriggles- or worse, _squirms. _On those days, Diggs' hands (or his face) will usually be shoved deep into the box, allowing the rats, the insects, the spiders, the scorpions, the fish, or whatever's lurking inside to bite him. If there's venom involved, he'll be allowed to lie on the floor while his stomach tries to punch its way out of his body and his mind screams at giant sprouting mushrooms- until he's finally given the antivenin. If there's no poison involved, he'll be held inside the box as the angry little creatures nibble ravenously at anything in reach. And if there's nothing vaguely hazardous about what's been kept in the box, if it's just a tankful of cockroaches, worms, or maggots… it's still disgusting, and it's still almost suffocating, and Diggs has to force himself not to imagine the repulsive little things crawling up his nostrils, slithering around the back of his eyeballs, inching towards his brain._

_Diggs wants to keep quiet during the sessions: if nothing else, he can suffer in silence and keep himself from blurting out any more secrets. And he fails miserably; not only does he spend every single minute of torture screaming in pain, but it takes him less than a week to lose his grip on his self-respect and start gibbering. In those humiliating hours, he tells the King everything he thinks he wants to know: he gives him the name and address of every single miner or geologist that was assigned to remove the Emeralds from the Nome Dominions; he provides up-to-date reports on the Emerald City's defences, including the runes that keep the city safe from magical attacks and hide it from the prying ears of Nome spies; he details the locations of every single government safehouse in the country; he confesses his real name in all it's embarrassing glory; he even tells the King where to find the Grimmerie, though he doesn't look especially impressed at this._

_And then, just as he's beginning to think he can't sink any lower, he finally begins telling the story of why he committed suicide: he tells the King about Elphaba being his daughter, of how he'd romanced Melena Thropp that one night before he'd taken on the mantle of the Wizard, how he'd been grooming Elphaba for the role of vizier before she rebelled, and how her death had driven him to suicide. And Diggs is praying that this bit of information will be exactly what the King wants to hear, and that he might find it his heart to finally…_

_But the King is laughing._

"_**In all the years the War Council had that spy hovering under the Governor's residence, I never thought a single report from it would have been worthwhile,"**__ he chuckled. __**"But then, I started hearing word of a young woman of extraordinary magical power, and I began following the trail of reports, all way back to the date of her conception. You see, I knew Elphaba was not the Governor's daughter- not biologically, anyway- but I had no idea that **_**you**_** were the travelling salesman!"**_

"_Roquat, please, if you have any mercy in your soul-"_

"_**I did say you'd have to earn my mercy, Wizard. Or perhaps I should call you Oscar? Or Diggs… no, no, too pedestrian, too human; I think you deserve a much more fitting name, something that fits both your initials **_**and**_** your nature…"**_

_Diggs isn't entirely surprised at the "Pinhead" epithet._

_Of course, it still stings: when he was a child, during the three years of formal education he'd experienced, he'd had to suffer the jeers and taunts of every other kid in the schoolyard who'd managed to learn his full name. True, the Nome King isn't as childish as that; he doesn't sink to the level of shouting "Pinhead! Pinhead! Pinhead!" right in Diggs' face but he does manage to find ways to bring it up in just about every single conversation they share._

_And he's not entirely surprised that the torture continues unabated. What demoralizes him more than anything else is that apart from that quiet chuckle to himself, the King only seemed vaguely interested in the news of Elphaba's parentage- as if the whole thing meant nothing._

_But that was the truth, wasn't it?_

_With the exception of his theft of the Emeralds, just about everything Diggs has ever done in his long and colourful lifespan is nothing more than a cheap joke to the Nome King._

_And for all that his flagging ego tries to convince him otherwise, Diggs knew that the King is absolutely right._

_So, in spite of the warning he's been given, Diggs uses a piece of scrap metal left under the table to make another suicide attempt. True to the King's word, it doesn't work: the improvised blade bends harmlessly around his wrists with every slash. _

_Meanwhile, the sessions offer even less hope for his attempts to die. Every wound that looks like it could be fatal is instantly healed via magic; the rest are cleaned with the most painful antiseptic that can be administered, and allowed to scar._

_(Thankfully, the wounds that result from the Crocodile Shears are treated as "potentially lethal.")_

_Of course, this doesn't extend to the treatment of broken bones, of which there are many, especially given the use of such instruments as the Copper Boot, the Rack, and the Iron Mallet. Most of the time, the King will re-set and heal a broken limb or extremity without even noticing it; occasionally, though, he'll simply leave it broken and allow it to set the wrong way. As such, life between sessions becomes increasingly difficult- as if it wasn't hard enough already- as simple tasks like walking and eating are extended to ridiculous lengths by the way his arms and legs have distended. _

_One day, the King offers him something to ease the pain, and Diggs jumps at the chance without even thinking that there might be strings attached to this innocent-sounding offer. In any event, he's given an injection of a dark, tarry-looking fluid and it doesn't just soothe the pain, but it makes him feel…_

…_well…_

_Wonderful._

_In all his years spent performing, conning, boozing and philandering, he has never felt so rapturously good: all of his sordid affairs, the hardened streetwalkers with their thick makeup and coarse manners, the lonely housewives who smiled with joy at the sight of him tramping down the garden path towards them, the shy, blushing, easily-impressed "volunteers" from the audience – none of his sexual escapades ever gave him this much pleasure. The drug, whatever it was, it makes him feel beyond the reach of any torture the King can threaten him with; it even makes him forget about Elphaba._

_And then, minutes later, the high fades, leaving him collapsed on his mattress in a blissful sleep._

_The next day, he asks for more, and the King obliges; the next day, he does the same; and again, the day after that. For one month, there are no tortures, no punishments, only glorious rapture as the drug pulses again and again through his veins, in progressively larger doses to satisfy his burgeoning appetite. For one unforgettable month, he is no longer Pinhead; he's not even Oscar Diggs, but the Wizard of Oz once more. He doesn't remember why he wanted to kill himself; he doesn't care that he's lost his kingdom and he's trapped underground at the mercy of one of his previous marks. His mind is too wrapped up in narcotic bliss to notice._

_But one day, he asks for his daily dose, and to his shock, the King refuses. No argument can convince him, no plea can sway him; he doesn't even explain why it's been withheld. He just vanishes back into the wall._

_The Wizard's chemically-enhanced ego politely informs him that this is obviously a tragic mistake: the dose he needs is arriving shortly, no doubt with many apologies, all of which he'll accept graciously._

_Two hours later, he's Oscar Diggs again, and he's slumped over his mattress in a sweating, twitching shivering heap: he's vomited at least three times, his bowels are on the verge of imploding, the room around him stinks from the overturned shit bucket, and the need for another dose is now so pressing that his veins seem to audibly scream for it._

_But it's never given._

_When the Nome King finally returns, the very last of Diggs' self-respect quickly vanishes down the plughole: he begs, he pleads, he threatens, he flatters, he bribes, he makes insanely honeyed promises that he has absolutely no chance of ever honouring; he even appeals to the King's better nature- assuming he has one. _

_But then he sees that the King is smiling for the first time in months, and he curses himself for not guessing the truth earlier: this was never about soothing his pain, or debasing him with addiction or even putting him through the agony of withdrawal. It was all a run-up to the moment when he, the former Wizard of Oz, had to beg; once upon a time, he'd demanded tribute of the Nomes and received the Emeralds without the slightest bit of diplomatic repercussion. Now, he has to get down on his hands and knees and beg for the very thing he needs to stop the searing pain in his flesh from consuming him, and he'll never receive it anyway because the King is finally enjoying himself._

_It takes days, but eventually the pain subsides, and the cravings fade along with it…_

… _Just in time for the torture to start all over again._

* * *

"And you were like this for a whole year?" Elphaba asked.

The Wizard- _Diggs,_ she reminded herself- nodded softly. "Hard to believe, isn't it?"

"Not really. I didn't think you got all that scar tissue from your last little chat with Glinda."

In spite of himself, Diggs laughed with genuine amusement. "Oh, I was amazed it didn't come to that, truth to be told; for someone who'd spent the last few years propped up in front of an audience, she took control of the country pretty damn quick."

Elphaba laughed too- but only once she'd crushed the upsurge of guilt she felt at the mention of the role she'd forced Glinda to assume. "You said you experienced visions," she said, quietly scrabbling for a new topic.

"So I did." Diggs pinched the bridge of his nose. "I suppose I should mention that if I'm going to be comprehensive. It began about six months into my imprisonment, a little while after the last of the withdrawal symptoms had faded. By that time, I thought that I'd gone as low as I could possibly go; I was actually starting to think that the King might run out of ways to torture me before the year was out." He sighed deeply. "I don't know if the King was able to read my mind and added the visions to the punishment regimen or if he'd been planning to do that from the very beginning. Either way, it didn't take too long to find out just how wrong I'd been…"

* * *

_In sharp contrast to the physical treatment he's subjected to, Diggs is given everything he needs to keep his mind from atrophying- if only so he can properly appreciate the effect that the torture has on his body: in the few hours a day he has to himself, he's given books to read, music to listen to, and paper to write on. The reading material is satisfactory but not always to his taste, and the music is too soothing and tranquil for him to listen with any real enjoyment- Diggs prefers the bombastic anthems and fanfares of Ozian marching bands- so his free time is spend hunched over the table, drawing. _

_At first, most of his attempts are incomprehensible scrawls; it's been a year since he put pen to paper, and since then his fingers and arms have been badly mangled. But eventually, he grows accustomed to the faults in his limbs, and slowly but surely, legible images begin to appear on the page in front of him: sketches for props he would have never been able to build on a stage-magician's salary; blueprints of magnificent machines that would have put even the mechanized Face to shame and made Tik-Tok look like nothing more than a windup toy; war engines that would have conquered entire worlds had Oz been able to build them en mass._

_Diggs isn't entirely sure how, but this overambitious busywork is what actually keeps him sane, if only because it's an alternative to the torture- a distraction from reality._

_Unfortunately, it's so much of distraction that it takes him a while to notice that he's missed at least three sessions that day; once he's gotten over the first jolt of anxiety and stopped thinking about how the King might be about to start torturing him again in the next few minutes, he begins to wonder if the next session is ever going to happen at all._

_What if the King has finally lost interest in punishing him? Better still, what if the King has finally forgiven him for his crimes?_

_But if that's the case, why hasn't he killed him yet?_

"_Maybe he's going to let me starve to death," he muses aloud._

_And from somewhere very nearby, a hoarse voice whispers, "More than you deserve, your Ozness."_

_Diggs stifles a gasp of shock, and asks, "Who's there?"_

_By way of an answer, there's the sound of feet- and paws, and hooves and other, less identifiable appendages- treading across the stone floor towards him, slowly growing louder with every hobbling step; in a moment of heart-freezing clarity, Diggs realizes that the footsteps themselves aren't growing louder: they're just growing more numerous._

_The word "angry mob" flits horrifyingly in and out of his brain._

"_Imprisonment has not been kind to you," says a voice from the approaching crowd. "It wasn't kind to us, either. But you still have your mind. You still have your life. You still have much to lose."_

"_What?"_

"_You heard me well enough, Your Ozness." Somewhere behind the voice's unsympathetic tones, Diggs hears something distorted in the speaker's voice, a drowned, half-choked gurgle. "We've been waiting a very long time for this day."_

"_Who are you?"_

_The voice laughs hoarsely. "You wanted to stop me from teaching, from speaking out against your atrocities. More than that, you wanted me and all my kind silent as the beasts you thought we were: I spent years imprisoned for the crimes you invented, so many years of my mind being driven back towards the primitive desires of an unintelligent animal that I couldn't even recognize the woman who could have rescued me. And once that was over and done with, you ordered my disposal; your underlings decided I was too old and broken to be used as a farm animal, so they had my throat cut and my carcass flung to the hounds. Does that sound familiar?"_

_Diggs' heart skips a beat, as the speaker takes the last few hobbling steps into light: even though the Goat has clearly been dead for almost year, even though his flesh now hangs in putrescent tatters from his weather-beaten bones, even though his horns have been broken into two jagged stumps protruding from the top of his bloodied skull, there's no denying that this visitor is almost certainly Doctor Dillamond. There's just enough of his face left for Diggs to recognize the familiar shape to muzzle, and the gold spectacles dangling from a chain around his shredded throat just about confirm his identity._

_But Dillamond isn't alone: behind him stand the figures of other Animals, all them dead and mutilated in some form or another. Diggs recognizes only a few of them- after all, it's been months since he toured the re-education facilities (the parts of them considered acceptable for him to visit, anyway) but a good look at their mouldering faces show that they remember him well enough. Most of them are as badly decayed as their representative, but a few appear to have been given to a taxidermist following their deaths, and now these well-preserved few stare blindly down at Diggs with eyes of polished black glass. But regardless of their condition, all of them are united by the expressions of rage and hatred that they wear._

"_Oh God," Diggs whimpers. "Oh God, Oh Sweet Merciful Jesus, no, no, no…."_

"_Did you ever wonder what would happen if you were to find yourself trapped in a room with all those you had abused and despoiled, Your Ozness? If not, I think this may prove enlightening."_

"_Please, I didn't mean to-"_

"_- order our destruction? Demand that we abandon our sentience and reduce ourselves to beasts? We don't care, Your Ozness. We are here for vengeance and nothing more."_

"_I swear, if you spare me, I will do everything in my power to-"_

"_You have no power, now; you have only empty words. If it's any comfort, this won't be lethal; think of it as a preview of your time in the afterlife…" The teacher's maggot-ridden lips twitch upwards in a ghastly smile. "A glimpse of what's to come."_

* * *

_For the next week, the "ghosts" are in charge of the torture: they don't bother to help themselves to the normal array of weapons and instruments that the Nome King has prepared; they simply attack him with their bare hands. Whatever magic has reanimated the dead Animals has also given them supernatural powers, for their decomposing fingers can tear through flesh like knives, and their touch seems to spread frost through just about anything permeable by the cold- including Diggs' soft tissues._

_Eventually, the ghosts fade away, and are replaced by long stints of confinement without visitors. Unfortunately, this gave the King a chance to surprise Diggs again when he finally got used to the solitude; one by one, figures from his past began to appear- old friends and acquaintances flickering into existence to project their vitriol and frustration at him, and occasionally just to beat him up. After a few sessions of screaming rows and recriminations, Diggs finds himself unable to blame them: most of them have legitimate grudges against him, especially the ones from the circus, who he'd "borrowed" equipment and techniques from in the earlier days. The old engineer who taught him how to design and assemble machinery was especially upset; apparently the money that Diggs had stolen from him meant that he'd ended up spending his final years in a home for the destitute. _

_It's not until Madame Morrible shows up that Diggs starts getting suspicious; there's no doubt that the woman's a careerist bitch, but the criticisms she voices sound a little too heartfelt by her standards. _

_Eventually, the penny twigs: for the last few weeks, he's been tortured and harangued by illusions, the products of a trick with only slightly more intrinsic magic than the smoke and mirrors that Diggs himself used to employ when he was still the Wizard. The final blow to his ego arrives when the Nome King politely informs him that, with the exception of the dead Animals, most of the information he used to create these illusions was gathered not from the usual underground spies he had spread out across the country, but from trawling Diggs' undefended psyche for information while he slept._

_The King follows this up by leaving Diggs alone for a few days, presumably allowing him to stew in his own embarrassment. _Or better yet, _he thinks to himself,_ giving me the chance to think about how my goddamn jailer can ransack my brain for information whenever I'm asleep. On the upside, he's probably not going to use illusions on me again.

_As it happens, he's right: he's woken up the next morning by the distinctive pressure of restraints being fastened around his arms and legs, and opens his eyes to find himself seated in a vast iron chair. As usual, the King is standing in front of him, the chosen torture device of the day hovering just above his hands: this time, it's a large vial of pale green fluid; even at this distance, Diggs can just about make out the tiny shapes wriggling around inside, pressing their repulsive-looking bodies against the glass in a futile attempt to escape. To his eyes, they look like a sinister attempt to crossbreed fish and pill bugs; either way, he'd rather not guess at what they really are- or what the King intends to do with them._

"_**There are some truly fascinating things to be found in the dark caverns beneath the Dominions," **__the King muses aloud. __**"These, for example- Carcassborn Trilobites, scavengers found in only the deepest of subterranean lakes. These are but their young, of course; the adults are much larger."**_

"_What's your point?" Diggs asks, trying vainly to take his eyes off the trilobites._

"_**The young require a great deal of food to reach their adult size, along with a safe environment to mature in. Of course, they have no way of hunting until they are mature, so the mother trilobite plants her young in the body of the largest animal she can find, and allows them to feast upon it until they are old enough to fend for themselves. But- and here is the truly extraordinary thing- if the animal isn't large enough to provide food for all the months they spend eating it, the young excrete a chemical that slowly changes their host's size and dimensions. Now, the host normally ends up looking like an oversized bag of meat attached to a hopelessly distended skeleton, but with a few subtle changes to the chemical application, I think I can make something quite unique out of this lump of scar tissue you call a body."**_

_Once upon a time, Diggs' ego might have felt a tad bruised by this remark, but by now he knows full well that it's true: the constant wounding and bone-breaking has had quite an effect on his body, and there's no denying he looks decidedly grotesque at this point. But that's little compensation for the ten minutes of screaming agony he spends in the chair as the King forces the baby trilobites down his throat._

_After this, he's left in the dark to await the stomach-churning mutations that will no doubt follow._

_Two hours later, nothing's happened yet, apart from a curious prickling sensation in his skin._

_Five hours on, Diggs is starting to wonder if the whole thing was a ghastly joke, because the prickling in his skin has vanished and his body doesn't appear to have changed in any way; of course, there's no real way of being certain about it, because the Nome King hasn't allowed him to keep a mirror in the cell. But then, the kind of change Diggs is undergoing should hurt, shouldn't it?_

_And then, the entire room gives a massive heave to the right. Diggs is flung to the floor, only narrowly avoiding being crushed by the table as it grinds violently across the room; he tries to get to his feet, only to fall flat on his face once again as the room shifts again, sending the papers on the table sliding on top of him. It takes a few minutes to dig himself out from under the heap, and by then, the room has lapsed into a full-scale earthquake._

"_What the hell is going on?" he asks, not expecting an answer. To his surprise, somebody does._

"_This is a first-priority emergency," a soothing voice intones. "There has been an accident in the magical testing grounds; time as we know it is undergoing a strictly localized collapse. The palace is in the process of being temporally disintegrated, and in all likelihood, the King is dead. All personnel must evacuate the building immediately."_

_Hastily ducking a piece of falling roof, Diggs unsteadily turns to find that there's a Nome standing behind him; it's clearly not the King, though. Quite apart from the fact that the voice is audibly different, the Nome's face has completely different structure, the most obvious feature of which is the calming smile. "Who are you?" Diggs asks._

"_I am one of the Palace Evacuation Officials; I have been charged with escorting all personnel from the building in as timely a manner as possible, under the automated orders of the Emergency Management."_

_Diggs briefly flounders; he doesn't have the slightest clue where he's going to be evacuated to, and quite frankly, it's probably going to involve another jail cell and more torture. So, he stalls for time. After all, he's been trying to kill himself for the last few months: why pass up a chance to succeed? "I'm not exactly personnel, in case you hadn't noticed," Diggs remarks._

_The official's smile doesn't falter. "Due to a recent vocabulary guideline referendum, the definition of the term "personnel" has been expanded to include prisoners, slaves, guests, and furniture. Please hold still while evacuation procedures commence."_

"_No, really, I'm fine: I know my way out from here, you don't need to worry about-" _

_Diggs' next words are lost in the grunt of surprise he emits as the official grabs him by the shoulders and charges headlong through the wall; for the next few seconds, the world around him is plunged into stygian darkness as the official hauls him through the unlit caverns, occasionally creating a mobile air cavity around him as they pass through solid rock. As they finally exit into the the tunnels closest to the palace, Diggs catches a glimpse of the subterranean fortress collapsing, its majestically-sculpted façade crumbling into rubble as a serious of brightly-coloured explosions tear clean through its walls._

_He can't be certain, but he thinks he hears the Nome King's voice, bellowing in rage and frustration. For a moment, he feels a certain degree of satisfaction, knowing that his torturer is finally dead; then the official puts on an extra burst of speed, and all Diggs can think of is his lurching guts, and the renewed itching in his skin._

_Minutes later, after a long and claustrophobic journey through the dark interspersed with brief glimpses of glittering Nome cities of titanic architecture and wildly-varying inhabitants, the two of them finally arrive, blinking and disoriented, on the surface._

_As soon as the official releases him, Diggs crashes to the ground, eyes stinging from the sudden emergence into the blinding light of day; it takes perhaps a minute or two for his eyes to adjust, and when he opens his eyes, he finds himself standing on the level stone floor of a vast barren plateau. As he stands there, shading his eyes from the pale glow of a sun he hasn't seen in almost a year, a dozen other sensations begin filing through his mind: the feel of the air on his skin, the smell of rainwater, the sounds of insects buzzing and chittering in the distance; finally the realisation hits him on a comprehensible level:_

_He's outside._

"_We are now outside the predicted blast radius," the official drones helpfully. "You are now permitted to return to your duties."_

"_But I don't _have_ any duties! I'm a prisoner!"_

"_The Emergency Management would like to remind all prisoners that they have a duty to remain in their cells and accept punishment. It has been noted that, given that we are now aboveground, said duties are now strictly optional. Hence, you are _permitted_ to resume your duties."_

"_So I can just leave?"_

"_Please note that a dutiful prisoner is an appreciated prisoner; you are allowed to roam free, but the Emergency Management may not necessarily approve."_

"_In which case, I think it's time you and I parted ways; it was nice knowing you, but to be brutally honest, I hope we never meet again."_

"_Warning: the Emergency Management has detected a number of temporal anomalies developing on the surface, and wishes to remind all prisoners that they cannot be held responsible for any injuries sustained by entering a potentially hazardous environment. Also, any period of stasis, progression or rapid aging suffered by prisoners during contact with temporal fields will not count towards their sentence; similarly, regression to childhood will not excuse prisoners from continued incarceration. Thank you for your time."_

_Diggs rolls his in annoyance, and limps away._

* * *

_He's free._

_After Christ-Only-Knows how many months imprisoned in his own private hell, he's finally free._

_Of course, the question that naturally occurs to him is "what the hell am I supposed to do now?"_

_Against all expectations, the desire to kill himself has faded, and has been replaced with an insatiable curiosity: after all those months away from Oz, what has become of the country? How is Glinda faring? Has she found a way of changing public opinion, of posthumously declaring Elphaba a hero?_

_He smiles faintly; _that_ might be worth seeing._

_And if not… well, maybe he can help- find a way to make amends for what he'd done to Elphaba._

_So, he sets off across the plateau, optimistic for the first time in ages; he isn't too troubled at the thought of encountering temporal anomalies, because quite frankly, he wouldn't know what to do if he walked into one, or even how to recognize it. He's not concerned by the fact that there's a magically-saturated desert between him and Oz; after all, if he can't find a causeway or some kind of transportation nearby, he can just travel to one of the other neighbouring countries and gather the materials for another balloon._

_He isn't sure how far he is from the border, though, or if he's going in the right direction, but then again, he's moving so damn slowly thanks to his hobbled legs, it probably doesn't matter anyway._

_On he walks, barely noticing that the itch in his skin has blossomed into a swollen-looking rash on his arms and back. He stops to rest every now and again to rest his feet, drink a few handfuls of rainwater and chew at the odd bit of non-poisonous fungi he uncovers; at night, he lies down to sleep on the bare ground, but he's usually so tired he isn't bothered until the little aches and pains start seeping in the next morning. _

_Sometimes, as he continues on towards the western horizon, he finds that the events around him seem to have slowed to a crawl, while his own comical stagger appears to have been sped to a lightning pace. At other times, he sees the sun move backwards across the sky, passing from evening through to morning in a matter of seconds. Diggs can't be sure if this is one of the temporal anomalies the official mentioned, or if it's his mind playing tricks on him; either one sounds equally possible._

_Two days into his journey, however, he starts feeling inexplicable surges of pain in his skin; the worst of it is around his arms and his back. Tentatively examining his body, he finds that what he thought was a mild rash is actually a series of revolting growths, too large to be dismissed as boils or sores; some are little more than random blobs of flesh and bone, while others actually seem more like functional organs. This is especially true of the ones growing from the fingertips of his left hand, which appear to be composed of bone as well as flesh, and are in the process of extending his fingers into eight-inch claws._

The trilobites, _he thinks_ _quietly_. They've started.

_What was he going to look like when this was finished?_

_More importantly, would there be enough time to find help before the transformation got any worse? With several hundred miles between him and the nearest friendly settlement, it didn't seem terribly likely, and even if he could somehow manage the distance in time, there probably isn't a cure for the transformation he's undergoing._

_But he keeps on walking, because quite frankly, what the hell else can he do? Other than lie down and wait to die of starvation, exposure, or a transformation gone wrong, there aren't too many options available to him. At least this way, he might have a chance to see how Oz has changed before he dies._

How it's improved, _he absently corrects himself._

_As the days grind onwards, the weather grows ever stranger as time continues to flow in odd directions: the moon eclipses the sun at least nineteen times in a single hour; comets patter down around him like split-second drizzles of rain; puddles of water are sucked into the air by stormclouds; the nights seem to last for weeks, with vivid fields of shimmering aurorae rippling across the dark sky. _

_Sadly, these extraordinary sights can only distract him for so long before his attention's drawn back to his growing number of deformities; every day, he awakes to find a little more of his old body gone, replaced with lumps of misshapen flesh, or, as the transformation grows more advanced, leathery pachyderm skin. Once or twice, he catches his face in a pool of water, and almost vomits in disgust and horror. But he can't avoid looking at the claws that are starting to replace his hands; whenever he reaches out for food and water, they're there, always a little long, always a little sharper._

_By the time the third week rolls by, the transformation has reached terminal levels: Diggs has grown several feet in height, to the point that he's had to discard most of his ragged clothes; his skin has turned a dark grey, and is thick with diseased lumps and vestigial organs. His spine has become so twisted and bent that he now has to travel on all fours; the fact that he's clearly still enormous even like this doesn't do much for his self-esteem. Diggs has also learned to avoid talking to himself, because his speech has taken a turn for the incomprehensible, dissolving into dozens of inhuman voices alternatively screaming, groaning, or laughing regardless of what he's trying to say._

_But on he goes regardless, loping ceaselessly across the barrens, a spindly-armed, crooked-legged thing moving far too quickly for its ungainly limbs._

_It's somewhat appropriate that it's not until he's on the verge of losing hope altogether that he happens to look out across the land and realises that he's arrived at the very edge of the Deadly Desert… and to his amazement, the sands are no longer blocking his way: the dunes that could easily destroy his new body once and for all have been swept into the air by what can only have been one of the most extraordinary sandstorms in Ozian history, and now hover there, suspended by a flickering pocket of time magic. This upheaval had left a very obvious if narrow trail of rocks leading into the distance- a path leading back into Oz._

_For the first time in a very long while, Oscar Diggs wonders if someone upstairs is trying to make a believer out of him._

_He lopes across the path, too excited to pay much attention to the drop he'll face if he loses balance; the greyish-yellow sands around him blur as he runs, faster and faster, until his malformed feet scarcely touch the ground; the journey should be tiring, but obviously something in Diggs' new physiology has given him the vigour to push past his fatigue. It takes hours to cross this desert causeway, but by mid-morning, the dunes have been replaced by the meadows and forests of Munchkinland._

_He continues running for a time, hurrying past countless farms, fields, pastures, even whole tows without even think of stopping. Eventually, he reaches a town that he recognizes as the largest and most cosmopolitan settlement in Munchkinland- and therefore the only logical place to find a doctor of any ability, or better yet, a way of contacting Glinda. There, he staggers to a halt under the shade of an oak tree to take a rest and study the town below; is there anything different here? Has anything changed since he'd last been here? Actually, that's probably not the right question to ask; after all, the last time he was anywhere near the outer reaches of Munchkinland was during his time as a salesman, and god only knows how much the place has changed since then._

_But as he looks around, he finds that he's wrong: nothing about the place has changed at all. The buildings haven't seen any demolitions or renovations, the roads and the traffic are still the same, even the people walking down the street look identical to the ones he saw twenty years ago. There's not even any sign that Glinda might have had an impact on the place. Diggs knows from personal experience that country towns are stubborn and resistant to change, but this is ridiculous._

_Taking a deep breath, he sneaks down towards the outskirts of the town: as far as he can remember there was a newspaper building hereabouts. Assuming he's not too late and he doesn't get caught in the act, there's a chance he'll be able to catch the leftovers of the previous edition before they're thrown out._

_It takes a lot of ducking and dodging to avoid the eyes of the Munchkins strolling up and down the paths, and even longer to climb over the wall, but eventually, he arrives at the headquarters of _The Crier._ And thank Christ, there's a large stack of abandoned newspapers waiting around the back of the building; actually picking one up without shredding it to bits is a trial, though. Eventually, he manages to gently tweezer one of the broadsheets out of the pile without turning it into confetti, and he's immediately greeted by a screaming headline of-_

**ANTI-ROYALIST CONSPIRATORS EXECUTED! TRAITORS TO THE CROWN FINALLY FACE JUSTICE!**

_Muttering a swearword that all eighty-seven of his voices mangle, Diggs hurries away from the building as quickly as possible; he doesn't know what to expect from the paper he has clutched in his claws, but he's not going to read it until he can do so undisturbed. His loping eventually leads him away from the town altogether, and into the neighbouring forest; there, he leans against a tree and start to read._

_The first thing he checks is the date, which naturally surprises him: somehow, all the wandering through pockets of time magic has deposited him in the past, just seven years after he'd arrived in Oz._

_As he reads, he finds that it's not just a question of time travel: somehow, he's ended up in completely different version of history._

_The article details the fate of a group of revolutionaries who had, some years ago, attempted to overthrow the royal family. Though most of them had been executed immediately, several more had appealed to various foreign powers to save them from the death sentence and had been waiting in jail for the decisions to be made; today, they'd finally been hanged. Diggs recognizes the names immediately; the men executed were been among those who'd helped him onto the throne back in his own timeline, either because they'd believed he was truly magical, or because they just wanted someone malleable in power. In other words, in whatever version of history he's ended up in, he never became the Wizard; but if that's the case, what happened to him? The article certainly doesn't mention him._

Well, so much for trying to find Glinda. Question is, what the hell am I going to do now?

_From somewhere very close by, a child's voice yells, "Nessa, be careful!"_

"_Can't catch me!" another child's voice shrills gleefully._

"_You know we're not supposed to get too far away from the house, Nessa!"_

"_Can't catch me, Elphie!"_

_Somewhere inside Diggs' distended ribcage, his heart almost stops. It can't be the same Elphie, it just can't be; Elphaba wasn't even living anywhere near this town, and it's too far away from the governor's residence for them to be just visiting. But he can't just leave this mystery undisturbed, either, not with a year of guilt and self-loathing forcing him to act. Trembling, he creeps through the undergrowth towards the source of the voices, trying not to make too much noise as he moves: it takes almost a minute or two, but eventually he's close enough to hear the children crashing through the bushes and as he gently parts the branches in front of him, he finally sees…_

… _her._

_She's probably not much more than six years old, but there's no mistaking the green skin and dark hair. Even at this age, her eyes have already taken on the fierce glare of her adult self; she's even wearing a black dress- tattered and dirty from play though it is._

_Against all odds and all hope, Diggs has found himself standing just a few feet away from his daughter._

_Right now, she's helping another girl to her feet; not much younger than Elphaba, her face shares a lot of the older child's features- with the exception of the green skin, of course-, so this is presumably the aforementioned Nessa._

_But if this is Elphaba's sister, then how is she walking? What happened to the wheelchair? What allowed her legs to properly develop in this timeline? More importantly, he'd heard Elphaba mention that they weren't supposed "to get too far away from the house"; did that mean they were living in the nearby town… or in this forest? Last he remembered, Governor Thropp had been a stingy old bore, but he hadn't been so stupid as to relocate his entire household to the middle of a forest. Of course, it was against tradition to move the seat of governance away from the manor, so what could explain any of this?_

_Just as these questions start slowly accumulating, another one neatly bulldozes them out of his mind: is this an opportunity to make amends?_

_An atom of hope quietly blossoms inside Diggs' mind: yes, it could be. After all, Glinda had told him just how unhappy Elphaba had been in the care of her father, how abused and neglected she'd been in her childhood. It would be fitting that in this alternate timeline, he'd be the one to set things right; he'd find a way to lead Elphaba away out of her miserable life, to give her the kind of life she truly deserved, and best of all, he would be able understand her perfectly, not merely because he'd known her as an adult, but because he now knows what it means to be an outcast!_

_Of course, it probably won't do to try and meet her right now; after all, Diggs isn't exactly at his most presentable, and he still doesn't know how to speak clearly enough to be understood. Perhaps it would be better if he kept an eye on them, if only so they weren't in any danger from abusive parents._

_The sisters are now wandering away, so Diggs begins slowly creeping after them, relying on his new limbs to provide him with a measure of stealth he never could have achieved in his old life._

_Quite naturally, he promptly trips over a tree root and goes crashing headlong through the undergrowth; he lands on his feet, thankfully, just managing to stop himself from falling flat on his face. Unfortunately, he's also landed right in the middle of the clearing, and he's now standing in full view of both little girls._

_There is a dreadful silence, as the two sisters stare in terror at the monster that now stands before them._

_Then, Nessarose screams, and everything seems to happen at once; without even pausing to scream, Elphaba grabs her sister by the hand and starts running as fast as she can. Diggs lopes awkwardly after them, trying vainly to explain that he's not a monster and that he's not trying to kill them or eat them; his voices immediately distort every single word he says into a nonsensical stream of cackling laughs and agonized wails that only encourages the girls to run faster._

_After twenty seconds of running and Diggs trying not to look any more monstrous than they already do, the trees part to reveal- of all things- _a house, _built right in the middle of a small clearing. Though clearly two stories high, it was a very ramshackle affair without any of the style or fripperies you'd expect from the Governor's traditional mansion. If this is Elphaba's home, then Frexspar Thropp is clearly no longer the Governor of Munchkinland._

_After hastily crushing a brief surge of joy at the humiliation the hateful old fart must have endured, Diggs immediately feels a wave of sympathy for the two children who he's ended up chasing: how miserable it must have been to end up trapped in such a run-down little bolthole like this, subjected to the abuses of a failure-crazed and possibly alcoholic father. _No more,_ Diggs vows silently, _they'll never have to put up with anything like this ever again.

_Then he hears Elphaba screaming, "Daddyyyyyyy!" and looks up to see a man hurrying out of the building. Though he's clearly lean and muscular, most of his features are obscured by his clothing: already dressed in grease-stained overalls and a pair of battered work-boots, he's also wearing thick leather safety gloves and a large steel welding mask. As he moves, his belt clatters with a variety of tools and devices, some of which are beyond even Diggs' engineering knowledge; but his eyes are drawn to the massive wrench in the man's left hand- and the oddly-shaped rifle in the other._

"_Elphaba!" he shouts, voice muffled by the welding mask. "Nessarose! Get inside, now! Warn your mother!" As the two quickly obey, the man (presumably Frexspar) puts his wrench aside and aims his rifle very carefully at Diggs' face. He then begins shouting angrily at him; most of the words are almost incomprehensible thanks to the mask over his face, but there are quite a few swear-words included._

Oh, here we go,_ Diggs thinks furiously. _The abusive father's getting territorial about his favourite human punching bags. Bald bastard.

_So, he opens his jaws and sounds off with the loudest roar his mutated vocal cords can emit; it's a doozy, enough to rattle windows and startle birds out of the trees, but credit where credit's due, Frexspar doesn't budge an inch. Instead, he tightens his grip on the rifle and opens fire; to Digg's amazement, he isn't hit by single shot, but by a continuous stream of bullets: somehow, the governor has managed to get hold of a fully-automatic rifle, something so rare and complex that only the richest Ozians could afford it during his time as the Wizard. How had an impoverished ex-governor managed to get hold of one of the most expensive weapons in the country?_

_Diggs is so surprised that he doesn't even notice that there are now at least fourteen bullets embedded in his skin. Thankfully, his hide's just as tough as it looks, and once enough reality's set back in for Diggs to realize what just happened, he lunges at Frexspar, raking his claws up at his overalled stomach. _

_But damn if the little bastard isn't fast on his feet, because he leaps out of the way so quickly that the claws almost end up embedding themselves in the wall behind him, and then fires another burst, nimbly ducking under the next sweep of the claws, and rolling under the one after that. Quite frankly, Diggs isn't too interested in killing the old politician- it'd be far easier just to knock him out and help the kids out of the house before he wakes up- but with the fight he's putting up, combined with the thought of the bullying the old cad subjected Elphaba to in both timelines, the idea of gutting him like a fish is becoming something of a temptation._

_And then, over the next few blasts of the rifle, Frexspar finally says something comprehensible: "You won't take them!" he yells, voice quivering with mingled rage and fear, "You won't take my children!"_

_Diggs' temper flares. "She's not yours," he roars back, his many voices for once screaming in perfect unison, "She's MINE!" The next swing of his claws knocks the rifle out of Frexspar's hand and lacerates him across the chest; down he goes._

_No sooner has Diggs taken the next few steps towards the house when there's a sharp pain in his back. It seems the slash across the chest wasn't enough to keep him down, and worse still he's armed with the wrench he tossed aside a few minutes ago. And that's just what he's holding in his right hand; fastened around his left, there's… well, it looks like a set of brass knuckles, but they're connected by a tube to a small container of fluid at his belt; with a press of a trigger set in the rightmost knuckle, the thing launches a jet of flame that burns even Diggs' rhinoceros-like skin._

_To his shock, Diggs is suddenly on the defensive, backing away from both the violent swings of the wrench and the gouts of flame. _First the automatic rifle and now this, _he thinks. _Where the hell did he get this stuff? He can't have just built it, can he?

_The wrench catches him hard in the chin, and Diggs all but scuttles out of reach, spitting out a few jagged-tipped fangs as he does so. He certainly doesn't remember the governor being this imposing; obviously, whatever changed this timeline also gave the bastard enough free time to build up some muscles…. and engineering skills, if the damnable flamethrower on his fist is any evidence._

_And then, miracle of miracles, Frexspar finally runs out of ammo, and the flamethrower grinds to a halt. In the split second he's distracted, Diggs lunges at him, sinking all ten of his claws deep into the old governor's stomach; with a roar of triumph, he hoists him above the ground, and lets him dangle there for a moment, impaled and dying, before flinging him aside._

_Someone behind him screams._

_Diggs turns around, and is promptly struck in the chest by a bolt of emerald-green lightning; roaring in pain and half blinded by the incandescence, he staggers backwards, trying desperately to get a look at his assailant before the next attack hits. Finally, the light fades enough for him to see, and he realises with a jolt of horror that what hit him wasn't caused by Frexspar's machinery, but by magic._

_Elphaba is now standing in front of the house, fingertips blazing with energy, and her feet barely touching the ground; her tear-streaked face is now set in the same expression of fury that Diggs has seen so many times in his memories and nightmares, somehow even worse when seen on the face of a child. And worse still, she's using the magic intrinsic to her own body, the power that- until Morrible trained her- was only sparked by the most violent explosions of fear and anger._

_He tries to approach her, hands extended in what hopefully looks like a placating gesture, but he's immediately sent flying by another blast of magic. Clawing his way upright, he looks up just in time to catch a brief glimpse of a very solid-looking elm tree, before Elphaba brings it crashing down on him; scampering frantically out of the way, he hurries back towards Elphaba, trying vainly to explain that he's not going to hurt her and that he's here to rescue her. _

_It doesn't work, and once again results in Diggs earning a searing blast of energy to the gut that brings him crashing to the ground; as he lies there, vision blurring and flashing, he realises that Elphaba has finally stopped to take a breath._

_Seizing the opportunity, he jumps to his feet and dashes towards her, arms reaching out to grab her as gently as possible; from here, it should be simple- he'll keep her restrained until she's calmed down and he's found a way to communicate with her, and then they'll leave, never to even think of Frexspar and his abuses ever again._

_Unfortunately, a split second before Diggs scoops her up, Elphaba recovers and blasts him with all her might; Diggs manages to stay on his feet for a moment, his claws flailing wildly through the air for a handhold, before the supernatural gale sends him tumbling away._

_He lands heavily on his stomach, right next to Frexspar's perforated corpse._

_As he struggles to clamber upright, he notices that the dead man's welding mask has jarred loose from his head in the fall to the ground, and he realises that this isn't Frexspar Thropp at all: there's no sign of the daggerlike nose, the bald scalp, the contemptuous sneer that not even death could erase. _

_Instead he finds himself looking into the face of a man he hasn't seen in years: in spite of the grime and dirt caked on his cheeks, the blood clotting in his thick hair, the pale, deathly cast to its features, there's still no mistaking the well-fed, amiable-looking face of __Oscar Zoroaster Phadrig Isaac Norman Henkel Emmannuel Ambroise Diggs, age 39._

_Diggs is staring into the eyes of his own corpse._

_He's… killed himself._

_Suddenly, the piece of the puzzle that had been floating around his mind instantly fit together: the newspaper didn't mention his name, because in this timeline, he'd refused to take part in the coup, either because he hadn't thought it was worthwhile… or because in this weird assemblage of events, his relationship with Melena had been more than just a one-night stand. Here, he'd been willing to turn the affair into a relationship, enough to eventually reveal himself as Elphaba's true father; whatever the case, it had almost certainly resulted in a divorce, probably while Melana was pregnant with Nessarose, hence why the girl wasn't confined to wheelchair in this timeline- Frexspar hadn't had a chance to start feeding his wife the milkflowers that would result in her death and Nessa's crippling. And so, this version of Diggs had ended up living out here, with all the time in the world to study his craft and care for the family he'd always wanted._

_And he'd been a better man for it, hadn't he? The devices he'd seen his other self use in battle had been hand-made; they hadn't been constructed by a team of artisans and engineers who bowed to his every whim, with only his word and his designs to guide them. His other self didn't need to cower behind a gigantic metal face; he'd leapt straight into battle in defence of his children. And most of all, his other self had cared about someone- not the affable "sentimental man" kind of caring which Diggs had claimed to feel about his citizens when he'd been the Wizard- but genuine human caring._

_Maybe he's just guessing compulsively, but Diggs knows that it least some of it has to be true, and he feels all the sicker for it; this hasn't gone the way he'd planned: he hasn't rescued two children from an abusive parent- he's murdered a loving father in cold blood and tried to kidnap his children._

_He lurches away from the corpse, hoping that he can somehow apologise, to at least get away without hurting anyone else. And then sees Nessarose, sobbing inconsolably as she kneels beside the blooded corpse of-_

_Oh, no. _

_No._

_No, he must have imagined it, it can't have happened again, not like this, not like this not like this…_

_Diggs vision focuses again on Elphaba's body; her throat's been cut somehow. For a moment, Diggs' mind can only scream in disbelief, not understanding how this could have happened._

_Then he remembers the final blast of magic that had flung him away from her, and how he'd flailed for a grip on anything in reach, his claws slicing through the air-_

_-slicing through Elphaba's throat._

_For a moment, Diggs feels as though his heart has well and truly stopped; every vein in his body has instantly turned to ice, leaving him numb and unresponsive to anything in the outside world. Even Nessarose' tearful shrieks can't even stir a reaction from him, for all he can think of in that moment are the words _Not like this, not like this, not like this, not like this not like this not like this not like this not like this not like this not like this not like this not like not like this not like this…

"_**BRAVO!"**__ a familiar voice booms._

_Diggs looks up; the world around him is fading, the forest and the house slowly dissolving into the stone walls of an underground cavern. His body is changing too, the elongated claws shortening back into fingers, the twisted spine moulding itself back into its normal shape and allowing him to walk upright again, the leathery skin softening into ordinary human flesh covered by ragged clothin- even his massive jaws and enormous eyes shrink back into his old face. But something is wrong: he still wears the scars and crooked limbs of the torture he suffered- the transformation hasn't healed him in any way. In fact, the more he thinks about it, the more he begins to wonder if he ever changed at all._

"_**BRAVO!" **__the Nome King roars again, his thunderous laughter shaking dust from the roof. __**"Encore, encore!"**_

_Diggs tries to respond, but all that can emerge from his mouth is a choked whimper._

"_**That's right,"**__ says the King, his face emerging from the ceiling. __**"It was all an illusion; the trilobites, the collapse of the palace, your escape and transformation- all just a dream. And I must say, I never imagined you'd remain as foolish and egotistical as you were as the Wizard, but some things never change, do they."**_

"_You… you did all that just to torture me?"_

"_**Not entirely; I was a little bit curious to see what would happen if you had the chance to set things right, to see how you would react in seeing a version of yourself who'd lived a more worthwhile life- by your standards, anyway. I wanted to see what would happen if you were to bump into a man who'd had the family you'd always wanted, who'd been a father to Elphaba when she dearly needed it. In fact, I was actually going to let you take his place if all went well, and let you spend the rest of your life in a dream while your body withered and died. Yes," **__he added gleefully,__** "You were within seconds of my mercy. And you failed: you killed your other self and your daughter- again, and not long after you tried to stalk them home, no less. So the study did have some very interesting results."**_

"_And what are those?" Diggs asks. He's barely managing to keep the tears at bay; he doesn't want the King to see him lose whatever semblance of control remains._

"_**Quite simply, you want to be punished; in that illusion, you had every opportunity to keep Elphaba safe without having to barge into her personal life. You could have been her invisible bodyguard, protecting her against the lions and tigers and bears and so forth; and from there, you could have actually been her father! You could have had a chance to erase your mistakes, even if the chance was only an illusion. But, to put it lightly, you blew it. You killed your other self without even bothering to find out who he was, and you murdered your daughter for the second time in almost as many years. Congratulations.**_

"_**The only conclusion I can draw from this is that, at heart, you're a masochist. So, if it's any comfort, allow me to assure you that, barring the remote possibility of me finally regaining an atom of mercy, you are now the single inhabitant of a Hell without end."**_

_Slowly, the King's face vanishes from the ceiling, and at long last, Diggs' fragile composure well and truly collapses: for the next half an hour, he sits there, sobbing and wishing he could simply lie down and die, because now the guilt and the sense of loss over Elphaba's death has somehow become even worse. He can no longer say he simply ordered her death; now he knows that he killed her, and he did so twice now._

_Even if this time, it was only an illusion, it still hurts so… damnably… much…_

_He recalls that, as both a con artist and a self-styled "benevolent dictator," he'd been proud to never be directly responsible for the death of another living being; he'd hidden behind so many delusions, so many pathetic lies and fallacies, but now he knows the truth:_

_He's a killer._

_He's a monster; the illusion of his transformation hadn't shown him being disfigured or deformed or twisted out of his natural shape in any way: it had simply showed him what he would look like if his body could somehow mirror his soul! Why else would the face of the monster bear the massive jaw and glaring eyes of the mechanical Face he had used to cow the people of Oz into submission?_

_Why else is he even alive if not for the punishment that a monster deserves?_

_This time, there are no rationalisations, no hope that he can see Elphaba in heaven or hell, no thoughts as to escaping or suicide; from then on, the only thing that occupies his mind is the spectral image of a murdered child._

* * *

The echoes died away.

Elphaba looked from Diggs' ashen face to the cave wall behind him; was the Nome King listening to this? Was he gloating over how he'd managed to finally destroy his opponent's will? Was he wondering what Elphaba would do next?

Diggs, meanwhile, was holding up something. "This appeared on my desk just a few days ago," he said quietly.

It was a postcard: somewhat unsurprisingly, the front showed an image of the Emerald City in the middle of the Nome invasion, caught in the act of being razed to the ground. On the other size, the King had written _"I can honestly say that I wish you were here: quite a few of the citizens were screaming your name as they died; others were actually praying for you to deliver them from their ruination. I should have brought you along; they'd have been so happy to meet you."_

"That's how I knew about the invasion," Diggs explained wearily, "all because the King wanted me to feel just a tad worse about myself- as if that was even possible! And somehow he managed it!" He laughed mirthlessly, and then quickly sobered. "You see why I want to die? If you spare my life, there'll only be more torture in store for me; I don't know what the King plans to do with you, but once he's finished, he'll show me every grisly detail just to make it hurt that much more. I know I haven't done much to earn mercy from you, so please, don't think of it as mercy-"

"Diggs-"

"-think of it as revenge for all the harm I've caused; for the death of your mother, for the crippling of your sister, for everything I did to the Animals, everything I ever did to you. I don't even care if you draw it out for hours on end, just… just kill me. Please."

Elphaba hesitated; looking into the face of the man she'd loathed for all the years she'd known him, she tried to find even a hint of the old bravado, the old swarm and charm that she'd despised so much. But there was no sign of it in the former Wizard's face; in fact, all she could see was exhaustion. And for the first time, in spite of everything she'd been told in the past half an hour, she couldn't muster the hatred she'd need to take his life; all she felt was a vague and simmering resentment, and…

Pity.

A strange idea formed in the back of her head, and she glanced back at the table; just as Diggs said, under it lay the remains of old torture machines, chunks of scrap metal that he'd tried to cut his wrists on at one point. She pointed a finger at one of the larger pieces of metal; obviously, the pressure on her magic had been lessened, for it instantly sprang into the air and began slowly hovering towards Diggs; slowly, a relieved grin formed on the man's scarred countenance. Clearly, he thought Elphaba was going to impale him on it.

"Do you want to stand up for this?" she asked gently.

Diggs nodded, and painfully hauled himself upright, his hobbled legs and crooked kneecaps dragging this simple task on for two whole minutes; once he was well and truly upright and standing as straight as possible, he took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and whispers "thank you."

"You probably shouldn't thank me so soon, Your Ozness," she said coldly. _"Ferruseld Magnetifus Estrallivar Vekt."_

The air was suddenly filled with the sound of metal being twisted out of shape, and Diggs opened his eyes to see that the chunk of scrap metal that he thought Elphaba was going to kill him with was now slowly reshaping itself, warping and bending into a new, unrecognizable shape. Slowly, as Elphaba repeated the incantation, more bits of discarded metal joined it, all of them being incorporated into the structure she was slowly building, augmenting it with improvised joints and hinges. It wasn't until the whole thing began fastening itself around Diggs' body that he finally realised what it was for: it was a support frame, a makeshift reinforcement structure for his damaged skeleton; with this, his legs could move without buckling or collapsing, and he no longer ran the risk over losing his balance and toppling forward or backwards.

Diggs was opening his mouth to protest, when Elphaba started chanting again; this time, the spell she cast was designed to relieve the pain in Diggs' limbs and bones, plus any chafing the frame might cause. At last, she stood back to survey her work. "There," she said. "How do you feel?"

"Weren't you _listening?"_ Diggs exploded. "If you leave me alive, he'll just keep torturing me!"

"No he won't. You know why? Because it wouldn't be as satisfying as watching the great Wizard of Oz die at the hands of his only daughter; after all, that's one of the reasons why he brought me here- though it's probably not the main one. You already told me he was prepared to set up whole worlds of illusions just to break down your self-esteem; what's to say he wouldn't appreciate the irony of you being murdered just seconds after you explain who you really are? I don't know about you, but I'm not going to let that bastard win so easily. I don't care if he was justified in torturing you or not: he's murdered thousands of people, destroyed most of Oz, kidnapped Glinda, and he's probably planning to do even worse- I'm not going to give him the pleasure of an easy victory."

"So you're just going ignore everything I've done to you? All the suffering I've caused you? You're just going to walk away and pretend that never happened?"

"_Mr Diggs,_" Elphaba snapped pointedly, "If I actually wanted to take revenge on you, I'd… well, just look at yourself. What could I possibly do to make you feel any worse?"

"Point taken," Diggs sighed. "But even if you're right about what the King wants, that means I've still got a lifetime in prison to look forward to, and that's assuming I'm not left to starve to death. In the meantime, you get to suffer whatever the King has planned for you. How is any of that better than just killing me and leaving the palace as quickly as possible before he can get his act together?"

"Well, for a start, he's probably already listening to us even as we speak, so there's no point trying to escape now." Elphaba smiled grimly. "Plus, would it hurt you to have faith in my abilities? When I said I wasn't going to give him an easy victory, I meant it."

There was a long silence.

"Does that mean… you forgive me?"

"In a word, no."

"Ah."

"Before you ask why, you've suffered for what you've done, there's no doubt about that, but you haven't made any real effort to make up for your mistakes."

"But how am I supposed to do that? I'm trapped in an underground prison cell with no way of escaping!"

"I didn't say you had to do it immediately, or in one go for that matter; any help you could give me right about now would be _very_ much appreciated…" She lowered her voice. "For example, does the King or the other Nomes have any kind of weakness, anything we can exploit?"

"Eggs."

"What?"

"Eggs; Nomes are vulnerable to chicken eggs. From what the experts told me back when during the first diplomatic talks, egg yolk actually poisons their magical cores: once they've eaten it, they just dissolve into nothingness- they can't even escape the poisoning by creating a new body."

"Is that why the Nome armies destroyed so many chicken farms?"

"Absolutely. Trouble is, I don't think you're going to be able to find one at short notice."

"Remember what I said about having faith in my abilities?" Elphaba grinned, but without conviction: she hadn't forgotten how badly she'd been beaten. "I'll be back soon. Don't worry." She turned, and began striding towards the door, mind racing through possibilities.

"Just a minute!" Diggs called.

Elphaba stopped, trying not to let the irritation show. "What is it?"

"It's about… well, you how I said that you're…" Diggs took a deep breath. "Are you okay with… well, with me being your father?"

"Why do you ask?"

"Well, I hate to state the obvious, but _you're my daughter_; I need to know these things."

Elphaba rolled her eyes. "I think you're still a long way from being allowed to call me that, Mr Diggs; I can't just up and forgive you for everything you've done, and I can't just start thinking of you as my…" She sighed; the word still left a bad taste in her mouth. "… My father. I think you'll have to work hard to earn that right. As for how I feel… I don't know _what_ I feel about it. It doesn't matter now, though: I can deal with it later."

"One more thing, before you go… what was that spell you used before? The one you used on that scrap metal, by the way."

"Ferruseld Magnetifus Estrallivar Vekt? It's a spell for shaping and controlling metals too strong to be moved with telekinetic magic. It's not a very powerful spell- it's so mundane I didn't even find it in the Grimmerie- but it has its uses. Why do you ask?"

"Just curious."

* * *

As Elphaba strode away, Diggs sat down awkwardly on the mattress, and wondered.

Over the course of a single meeting, his life had turned upside down; against all expectations, Elphaba was still alive, she'd refused to kill him, and she'd suggested that there might- just _might-_ be a chance for her to forgive him if he worked hard enough to redeem himself. There was always the possibility that this might just be another one of the Nome King's illusions after all, but for some reason, Diggs no longer thought it mattered.

Supposing their conversation _had_ been real; supposing he really had heard Elphaba saying that there was some hope left- and that there was; if so, where should he start? Could there be some way of helping her against the Nome King from this cell?

He thought back to the incantation he'd heard: _Ferruseld Magnetifus Estrallivar Vekt._ He couldn't forget those words; they were embossed on the inside of his skull, too powerful to forget if only because Elphaba had shown him mercy though them. And something about the spell itself, about its function and its uses struck a chord with him as well: it wasn't something that could destroy entire cities or change the course of history or anything like that; it was just a spell for manipulating metal. And with that spell, Elphaba had accomplished in minutes what a skilled metalworker could only have done in hours.

In all his years surrounded by magic, he'd never once been inclined to learn any of it; he'd left that to the magicians who'd offered their services to him. But now he wondered if it was possible for an old fraud like him toactually use _real_ magic.

He glanced under the table; there were still a few bits and pieces of scrap metal there.

Focussing his attention on the lumps of iron and copper, he pointed a finger at one of the largest possible sections, and recited, "_Ferruseld Magnetifus Estrallivar Vekt."_

Nothing.

"_Ferruseld Magnetifus Estrallivar Vekt," _he repeated, louder this time.

Still nothing.

This time, he gave it everything he had: he focussed every last iota of his concentration on the scrap heap before him, waved his hand with all the flourish of a trained conjurer, and bellowed, _"Ferruseld Magnetifus Estrallivar Vekt!"_

There was soft popping sound, and a screw leaped out of one of the largest sections of metal and landed at Diggs' feet.

Diggs smiled.

He didn't know how this was going to help him or Elphaba, but he was going to do his best to find out how.

After all, he had something to strive for now.

* * *

A/N: Coming Up in the next chapter- the Nome King finally explains his plan!

PS: You looked up Crocodile Shears, didn't you?


	25. Visionary or Madman?

A/N: Hello ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to my latest chapter! I know a lot of you are anxious to see Elphaba re-united with Glinda, but I beg your indulgence for just a few chapters more: it'll be here soon- it's just that we have the earth-shattering revelations and outrageous temptations to get out of the way first. So, for this chapter, earth-shattering revelations! I hope you enjoy it, and I hope that the twists and turns are both surprising and decently foreshadowed. Without further ado, read, review, and above all, enjoy!

Disclaimer: Wicked doesn't belong to me. Neither does Return to Oz, or the rest of the Oz series for that matter.

PS: Yay! 25th chapter!

* * *

Basalt had not expected this, to say the least.

He could only stand in near-astonished silence as his borrowed spy finished recounting the details of Elphaba's meeting: the Wizard, hated and despised by almost every Nome capable of emotions, had been imprisoned in the dungeons of the palace for over a year without the Council or any other Nome authority hearing of it. Not only did this add unlawful imprisonment and torture to the King's growing list of crimes, but it also raised a number of troubling questions: how had the King prevented anyone from learning of the Wizard's arrival? How had he managed to keep the dimensionally-disconnected cell from the watchful eyes of Council surveyors?

More to the point- if all the evidence and the Wizard's testimony was to be believed- just how much power had the King attained, and from where?

Of course, if Basalt did know the answer to the any of these questions, there would be no guarantee that he would be able to do anything about it; after all, the Council was nowhere in sight, all other Nome authorities were powerless to deal with the King, Elphaba's rebellion had failed, and the spies were still keeping a close eye on him, so he wouldn't be able to take any action before being arrested and summarily executed.

From what his own spy had told him, Elphaba was now moving upstairs to the Nome King's office, presumably to discuss the work he intended her to perform and bargain with her to that end. So, starved of any useful ideas, Basalt sent the spy back out into the palace corridors to eavesdrop on the conversation: if nothing else, there was still an opportunity to learn a few remaining details of the King's plan - specifically the ones that Basalt had averted his ears from during Glinda's first conference.

As the spy hurried away, Basalt settled himself against the wall of the cell, and began habitually surveying the area for any visible threats. Finding none except for the spies at the opposite end of the room, he was halfway through his ranged check of Glinda's breathing and heartbeat when he realised that the spy had mentioned something very important in his report:

Somehow, even after Elphaba had left, the King had forgotten to remove the Wizard's cell from the palace.

* * *

By the time she'd arrived at the top of the stairs, Elphaba's brief surge of confidence had faded into the ether: she'd had the chance to think about the Nomes' one existing weakness, and assuming it hadn't been fabricated to confuse their enemies, there' be absolutely no chance of finding an egg anywhere inside the palace. More to the point, with the shackles around her powers still in existence, there wouldn't be any way of reaching one. So, that left her facing down the so-called "business proposition" that was no doubt waiting in the room that the attendants had directed her to.

She hadn't had the time to look carefully at the papers on Glinda's desk, so she hadn't the slightest idea what the Nome King intended her or Elphaba to do- or what he was prepared to offer in the latter case. Elphaba wasn't looking forward to it; mostly because it would probably be half a stultifying hour of infuriating offers that probably wouldn't even vaguely compensate for what she'd have to do in return; partly because...

She hastily deleted the sentence from her mind before it could complete itself. She had questions to ask, and it wouldn't do to have her brain cluttered up with how badly this interview could go.

As the door gently closed behind her, Elphaba found herself standing in what looked to be a study or office of some kind: though all of it was rendered in the customary bare rock of Nome architecture, there was no disguising the colossal desk in the centre of the room, or the comfortable chair directly opposite it. Carved into the walls around it were shelves, dozens upon dozens of them, each one filled with books; from what little Elphaba could see, a lot of them were spellbooks or scholarly discourses on magical power. Occasionally, though, titles of much humbler books would seemingly leap out at her, some of which she recognized: epics like _The Death of Centuries, _or _Built Upon The Fallen; _books on Ozian culture (written prior to the Wizard's arrival, Elphaba noted); stories of travelling into uncharted lands, fictional or otherwise; there was even a fairly recent-looking one entitled _No One Mourns The Wicked: An Authorized Biography of the Wicked Witch of the West._

The Nome King, who was seated behind his desk, noticed her wandering gaze and laughed quietly. **"Don't worry, it wasn't **_**all**_** looted from Oz; I've been collecting mortal literature for many centuries now, and I've built up quite a private library. Tell me, Elphaba, what do you think?"**

"I'm surprised you're not asking me why I spared the Wizard's life," she said flatly.

"**You already made your answer to that perfectly clear; I **_**do**_** listen to these things. I don't blame you for spiting me, but it will make Pinhead's death just a tad less satisfying. So, in the meantime, let's get down to business: you obviously want to know why you were captured and what I want from you, so by all means, ask me whatever you wish."**

"What's your story?"

"**Beg pardon?"**

"What's your story, _Your Highness?"_ said Elphaba pointedly."Why are you doing this? I know how the Wizard conned you into giving up the Emeralds, but that doesn't explain why you'd go to such lengths just to take revenge on him. I can understand imprisoning him; I _might _understand you torturing him- if you'd finished by executing him instead of trapping him in his own private nightmare; I can even understand your attack on the Emerald City, if only because you wanted the Emeralds back. What I don't understand is why you destroyed the rest of the country after that; how could anything the Wizard did to you justify doing _that?"_

"**Believe me, Elphaba, you wouldn't want to know: it's a long and boring tale of politics and bureaucratic nonsense, nothing that you and I should concern ourselves with. Besides, I did notice your interest in Glinda's attempts to translate the Grimmerie; no doubt you still want to know what I spell I requested from her-"**

"-and what spell you'll request from me," Elphaba finished. "Yes, I am curious. But I do want to know why I'm here first, and that means that you have to explain just why you took revenge on all of Oz as well as the Wizard."

"**Even if it bores you to tears?"**

"_Especially_ if it bores me to tears; I think I deserve an answer, Your Highness."

"**You do,"** the King admitted, his smile beginning to fade.** "But as I said, it's not exactly relevant to our conversation now. Suffice to say, the Wizard stole a national treasure ; once it was determined that he was a fraud, I launched an attack on Oz to regain the Emeralds, and laid waste to settlements around the country to ensure that there would be no military reprisals. End of story."**

"If it was, you'd have left it at that: you'd have executed the Wizard a long time before you'd have even dreamed of attacking Oz, and you wouldn't have bothered reforesting the country either. There's much more to the story than you're telling me, and I'd like to know."

The smile on the King's face was gone, replaced by a tight-lipped frown of annoyance. **"It really **_**is**_** inconsequential, Elphaba; I don't know why you should care in the slightest. I mean, isn't "I don't like having national treasures stolen by jumped-up ex-confidence tricksters" enough explanation?"**

"You weren't listening to every last minute of my talk with the Wizard: he told me that you said that if there was any justice in the world, you'd have been exiled for losing the Emeralds. That means that you had the final say over what happened; so, if it was your fault, then why _weren't_ you exiled? More to the point- and I hate to sound insensitive- they were just national treasures, weren't they? Why would you have gone through so much trouble over them?"

"**You're doing a lot to complicate an issue that should be over in a matter of minutes; why in all the echoing caverns of the earth would you care in the slightest?"**

"How am I not supposed to care? Why wouldn't I want to know more?"

"**I've given you all the explanation you could possibly need!"** the King snapped, his veneer of affability cracking loudly. **"I hardly think the rest of it is any of your business!"**

"Isn't it? So Oz hasn't been invaded and destroyed, Fiyero and Glinda aren't being held captive in this palace, the Wizard hasn't been tortured for crimes that would- at best- warrant life in prison, and I'm not standing here trying to figure out what your real motivations are. It's nice to know you're keeping up your reputation for honesty and openness… oh, wait! You don't have a reputation for anything except _bulldozing my homeland to the ground._ Call me old-fashioned, but if I was trying to hire a witch for whatever sordid work I had in mind, I'd give her a good reason to trust me, and the very least explain why I'd torn her country apart over a few crates of emeralds-"

The King rose to his feet with a rumble of shifting stone, and for a moment, Elphaba thought he was going to lose his temper again: his expression hadn't worsened from the disgruntled frown it had been wearing for the last few seconds, but it was easy to tell that he was furious by his clenched fists and twitching shoulders- and by the fact that some of the papers on his desk had caught fire. Then, the King took a deep, shuddering breath, and seemed to calm. **"You have a point,"** he admitted, sitting back down again.

"Nice to know you're not completely insane."

The King laughed mirthlessly. **"Sometimes I wonder if I'm even **_**that.**_** But then again, you might say that it's the source of the problem itself."**

"What do you mean?"

He hesitated. **"Please understand that this will not be an easy confession."**

"Why? Is it because you'll have to explain your masterplan to me?"

"**Far from it: my plan- or at the very least, half of it- requires me to explain the details of it to you; true, it's not without risk, but at least it's calculated risk. No, the reason why I balk at explaining my motives to you is much simpler: it's an unpleasant issue and I just don't like talking about it."**

Elphaba snorted. "Given that you've spent the last few days doing your very best to eradicate Oz and its people, I really have to wonder just what _you'd_ consider unpleasant."

"**Do you?" **asked the King, snidely. **"Picture, if you will, a scene that never happened: the castle of Kiamo Ko, just a few scant hours before your death; Dorothy Gale cowers before you, terrified, helpless, and without the slightest chance of escaping your wrath. But, in perhaps her first moment of defiance, she asks- no, **_**demands**_** to know why any of this had to happen: why you've hunted her across the country, why the Ruby Slippers are so important, why you even started your reign of terror in the first place. Would you answer? Would you welcome the chance to air your frustrations? Would you worry that she wouldn't believe you?"**

"I don't know. And in all likelihood, I'll never get the chance to find out, so it doesn't matter."

Was it her imagination, or did the King's smile seem even more mischievous than usual? His face changed too quickly for Elphaba to be certain of what she'd seen, but even as the last dregs of the smile faded, she couldn't help but wonder what the King was up to _this_ time. Hastily shoving these details out of her mind, she sat down in the chair provided, and waited for the story to proceed.

"**Before you parted ways," **The King began, **"Madame Morrible told you a little of my people, as I recall. She didn't tell you about our lifespans, though."**

"I think I can guess, though: I've already seen that you can reform your body after it's been damaged, so it's not too big a leap to imagine that you're immortal as well."

"**In the sense that I cannot die of old age, yes; we are all immortal, all incapable of dying except through misadventure… but we certainly can't be called unaging: as our lives carry on, our minds mature just as any sentient creatures' do, developing in ways that even our promotions cannot influence. We grow as individuals: some grow wiser, others grow childish; some become selfish to the point of cannibalism, others give up everything in the service of others- the permutations are infinite. But in the end… well, it only appears in the oldest and most accomplished of us, usually Kings; after two millennia of study, we still don't know if it's a disease or simply the natural conclusion of our life-cycle. **

**"It starts so very innocently- with a loss of focus; slowly, our wits and instincts dull to the point that almost anything can catch us off guard. Of course, that doesn't matter so much when the next symptoms appear, and our attention drifts to the point that we barely even notice anything within a three-foot radius. Memories become distant, eventually only reachable in sleep. Eventually, the fantasies and daydreams we have attained over the years become more vivid than ever, slowly eclipsing all real concerns… and finally, our minds abandon reality altogether." **A sad grin arced across his face. **"The condition always ends in catatonia, and it's always irreversible."**

Elphaba remembered Dr Dillamond, and shuddered, recalling how she'd witnessed the apparently "innocent" beginnings of his collapse into insentience. She hastily swept the unpleasant memory away, and asked, "What happens to the affected Nomes?"

"**In all honesty, little can be done for them: the process is almost totally irreversible. So we allow the afflicted to retire in peace; Kings stay just long enough to witness the coronation of their successors before leaving the Nome Dominions forever."**

"But where do they go?"

"**Anywhere, really; in the end, they generally find a secluded place to rest, and stay there for the rest of eternity, dreaming. I think you might have seen a few of them yourself."**

"Uh… I don't think so; I'd probably remember seeing something like that."

"**Kiamo Ko had a magnificent view of one from the western tower, if memory serves."**

Elphaba thought for a moment. "Are you saying that retired Nome Kings become _mountains?"_ she demanded incredulously.

"**Not all of them; it's a matter of personal preference, really: as I recall, the King that settled down in that area always did enjoy a lofty vantage point. But even if the old King is too detached from reality to move under his own power or choose a place of his own, his attendants will still carry him out to a place where he can relax and contemplate infinity… and in all the eons Nomes have existed, there has been only one exception to this rule: me."**

"**Around the time when the Wizard vaulted himself into power, I started experiencing the first symptoms. I'd been King for over a millennium, alive for Gods only know how much longer- I lost count at somewhere around fourteen thousand eight hundred and twenty-seven year. I'd had a long and prosperous reign, my successor was ready, and my legacy was assured. I was even beginning to come to terms with the fact that I'd never see any of my old friends and allies again except in dreams, when someone brought up the situation in Oz: there was a new ruler in place, and our experts felt that it would be best if we made a good first impression by sending in an ambassador… and like an **_**idiot,**_** I volunteered. Everyone objected, of course, from my closest advisors to the War Council, but after a lengthy debate, I managed to convince them that I was still lucid enough to handle the negotiations." **The King sighed deeply. **"To this day, I have no idea what I was thinking: maybe I was trying to prove that I still had all my wits about me, maybe I honestly thought that I could still function as a diplomat… It couldn't have been on a mad whim, though; I'm certain of that, at least. But in any event, I was sent into Oz- with a retinue of advisors and assistants, of course.**

"**At the time, the Wizard's capital was still unfinished: from what I could discern, he had been planning to make it exclusively from white marble, a metropolis of gleaming spires and towers. Then, of course, I arrived with offerings of trade and alliance; I played the role of diplomat to the letter, I minded my manners, I kept myself more-or-less human sized, I told the representatives of everything we could give Oz in return for their favour, right down to our mineral wealth. Two days later, I was summoned to the Wizard's throne room… and unfortunately, the meeting didn't go anything like yours."**

"In other words, he conducted the whole thing from behind the giant face. I'm not entirely surprised; when I met him, he only showed himself because he wanted to start our relationship off on a friendly note. I think he'd be a bit too scared to try and speak to you in person."

For a moment, the King looked as though he might laugh. **"If only that was the beginning and end of it: you see, at the time, I believed him."**

"What?"

"**I know: it should have been easy to see that he was a false magician even with all the mechanical trickery on display, but by that time my wits were so dulled that I accepted his lies with all the naiveté of a child." **The shame in the King's voice was audible now.** "I accepted every single daft conjuring gimmick as the truth, I promised to give him everything he'd requested, and returned home, praising him as a magician and an ally with every step. Before an audience of only my most powerful followers, I recommended allowing the Wizard's miners into the country and taking the Blessed Emeralds as a token of our newfound friendship. True, some protested, but those naysayers were outvoted by the War Council, the commanders of our military; you see, they'd read the reports my attendants had filed, and they could tell the Wizard was a fraud that I'd been too befuddled to see through. The Council should have done everything in their power to stop me: they should have cancelled the bargain, declared me unfit to rule, and sent me into retirement before I could do anymore damage- or exile me to a place too inhospitable for me to ever acclimatise to, if they thought my blunder was especially heinous. Instead, they gave my decision all the weight it didn't deserve and allowed the Ozian miners to take what they wanted."**

"But why? What did they have to gain by handing over the Emeralds?"

"**Nothing. They couldn't have cared less about the Emeralds, and they couldn't have cared less about Oz; by and large, the incident would have been ignored by them under normal circumstances- we'd been at peace for so long that the generals had nothing to do but jockey for power amongst themselves. But I'd shown them just how feeble-minded I really was, and they jumped at a chance to seize all the power they could possibly want. This way, they didn't have to go to the trouble of removing me from power altogether and building a new government from scratch; all they had to do was keep me around, and ask my permission for whatever mad reformation they desired.**

"**As my mind drifted further and further away from reality, the Council took on the responsibilities I was too detached to deal with: they unofficially supplanted me as King, forced my successor into the role of an advisor, and bit by bit, they removed every single one of my old supporters from office and replaced them with loyal dupes. They even began stealing tiny morsels of magical power from me, draining my strength bit by bit and never allowing it the time to heal, until even the most basic movements through the earth were challenging to me. And two years after that, they began looking for **_**political**_** might: across the Dominion which had once been mine, qualified Nomes were ousted from their jobs and replaced with the duly-sworn lackeys of the council. Those who attempted to resist were harshly punished, some of them by being imprisoned within their bodies and made into bricks… quite a few of which ended up finding their way onto Ozian construction sites.**

"**But do you know what the most damning thing of all was? I didn't notice any of it. In all the years that the Council spent twisting Nome society out of shape, I was cloistered away in this very office, lost in my reading or in own dreams… **_**enjoying myself.**_** Gods forgive me, **_**enjoying myself**_** while my Kingdom was reduced to a playground for a mob of overpowered generals!**_**"**_

In spite of everything the Nome King had done in the past few days, Elphaba found herself saying, "But you said yourself that you were near-catatonic at the time! You can't blame yourself for succumbing to an illness-"

"**That is not the problem, Elphaba: had I succumbed to my illness prior to my mission to Oz, nothing would have happened. I would have been retired, my successor would have replaced me, a more reliable ambassador would have been assigned to handle things, and that would have been the end of it. But because I tried to prove that I was still competent, because I allowed myself to be distracted by the Wizard's trickery and because I allowed the earliest symptoms of this disorder to get the better of me at a pivotal moment, I gave complete autocratic control of my kingdom to a military dictatorship and undid **_**everything**_** that I and my forebears had worked for. In short, I **_**can**_** blame myself for what happened, because, regardless of my condition, I **_**am**_** to blame."**

There was a long silence before the King continued. **"I told you that there was no cure for the disease; well, I found a rather unexpected way of purging myself of all symptoms- an explosion large enough to tear my body into inert rubble. By that stage, I'd been divorced from reality for so long that an explosion was about the only thing that could have surprised me; I transmitted my spirit into the nearest available body, consuming its previous inhabitant to heal the damage I'd sustained in the blast… and accidentally cured myself in the process. I was still weak, still lacking much of my old magical power, but I was once again lucid. Lucid, and extremely angry, of course, but I couldn't take any kind of action against the council until I was fully restored, so I played dumb. As luck would have it, the body I'd claimed was declared King by the unsuspecting War Council, and I was once again pushed into the background, where I could work in peace and occasionally thumb my nose at authority by having a palace built against all the conventions of Nome law. **

"**Eventually, I found that lot of the spies had been left untouched by the attempted purges- if only because most of them were judged too simple to be disloyal**_**;**_** so, given that I didn't have much else to do apart from appear at parades and look official, I had the spies comb the surrounding lands for anything that could grant me an edge over the Council. For months on end, the search was fruitless except for a few scattered rumours of the Grimmerie, which was kept well beyond my reach; so, while I expanded my search, I had a few of my spies examine the relationship between Oz and my people, to see how the Nomes had been received following the bargain."**

"I didn't think they were received at all," Elphaba remarked. "I mean, it would have been mentioned in the newspapers and periodicals if Nomes had ever made any public appearances in the Emerald City- or anywhere else, for that matter."

"**Exactly: all negotiations between Ozian and Nomish ambassadors were conducted in privately-owned basements outside of the Emerald City; the records of our very existence were kept from the public; the miners who'd been sent into Nome territory had been sworn to silence; even my first appearance in Oz had been covered up through bribery and threats." **The King's expression darkened, brow furrowing with pent-up anger. **"And as far as the populace was concerned, the Emeralds belonged to Oz. The miners- those parasitic coprolites who'd marched past throngs of Nomes begging them not to take the Blessed Emeralds- they were lionized as pioneers in underground exploration, as "Exemplars of Ozian Pluck and Determination!" And as for us, we'd been forgotten- no, worse…"**

On a nearby shelf, a book began to shake violently, and then abruptly flung itself into the air; it landed with thunderous crash on the desk in front of Elphaba, and she barely had time to discern the title- _Monsters of Myth and Legend: A Comprehensive Bestiary of Mythological Creatures- _before the book almost _exploded_ open, its pages fluttering wildly to the left in a gale of motion. Eventually, the breeze subsided, leaving Elphaba staring down at page 356: there, taking up the entire right-hand page, was a massive illustration of a Nome warrior, its hands reaching out towards the reader, its cavernous mouth open in a silent roar of anger.

_By far one of the most obscure of all the creatures detailed so far, _the entry read, _Nomes were a race of barbaric troglodytes rumoured to have been encountered by the brave miners who first discovered the now-legendary Emeralds. Though tales of monstrous, rock-skinned beings still persist in the smaller mining towns of Oz's north, Nomes have long since been debunked as boogeymen created to dissuade children from taking up mining as a career -_

"_**THAT,"**_the King roared, **"Is what the Wizard and the people of Oz reduced us to! Barbaric troglodytes! Boogeymen! Fairytales! It's bad enough that they stole from us, inadvertently ruined our society, almost made our society as vapid and power-hungry as theirs, they but worse still, they pretended that we never existed! "** He took a deep breath; the pages of the book were beginning to smoulder.

As the air began to cool again, Elphaba finally spoke. "So this is all about revenge?" she asked quietly. "All of this was about taking revenge on the Wizard and Oz, and once I've given you all the power you want, it'll be about taking revenge on the War Council. Is that it?"

"**In a word, no: our people have grown so used to emulating humans that we've gotten even worse than Oz under the Wizard; we've grown stagnant and motionless, we hunger for things we have no real need for. I mean, does it seem even vaguely reasonable to jockey for political power and social influence when **_**magical **_**power can restructure matter and control the mind? Even if I were to remove the War Council from power and undo the damage they've done to our society, the problem would remain in those who remain loyal to them, and even if I could convince them to give up their deviant views and rejoin functional society, there's still no guarantee that we wouldn't begin the slow plunge into depravity all over again. So, it's time we move on from this existence."**

"How do you mean?"

"**Countless millennia ago, we were little more than near-mindless spirits of the earth, devouring and developing the earth only as our meaningless appetites dictated. But through magic, we ascended: we became like the humans who dwelt above us. And now that we've become **_**too**_** much them, it's time to ascend again."**

"But what are you supposed to ascend _to?_ You're already earth elementals! You're immortal, you can create new bodies for yourselves at the slightest thought, you've got access to powers that most magicians can't even dream of! I've heard of thaumaturgical experiments where people have tried to _become_ elementals! Where could you possibly go from here?"

"**We're still too grounded- no pun intended; we can exist without having to take on physical forms, but our spirits can't leave the confines of the earth. And we're still tied to physical reality, to hierarchical societies. We need to evolve, to take on bodies of purest magic, to each exist alone and independent of one another. And you, Elphaba, might just be the key to our ascension."**

In the hopeful pause that followed, Elphaba decided that the King was almost certainly insane by both human and Nome standards; his goals were delusional, his methods didn't stand the slightest chance of working, and the violent mood swings she'd witnessed in the past few hours were just icing on the cake. Putting aside the long list of reasons why the plan was impossible, she summarized it as concisely as she could: "Well, I'm sorry," she said, trying to sound reasonable, "but I don't think there are any spells in the Grimmerie that can grant the effects you're asking for, and I doubt I'll have the time or the will to cast them on an entire species anyway."

"**The Grimmerie isn't going to be used for that."**

"Ah. That's a relief, I suppose."

"**It's going to be used to transform me into a human being."**

Elphaba blinked. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't I hear something about you wanting to be _less_ human a few seconds ago?"

"**You did."**

"And _now_ you're telling me you want to actually _become_ a human being."

"**This is true."**

"You're completely mad," she said bluntly. "You know that, don't you? There really is no getting around the fact that you have lost your grip on reality."

"**Perhaps I should clarify things to avoid any further confusion. Now, when I told you of my search for magical artefacts to augment my strength, I didn't actually tell you if I found anything apart from the Grimmerie."**

"Well, I saw you in action when you captured me, so I assume you either found something, or you were lying through your teeth about losing your strength at all."

"**It so happens that I **_**did**_** find something: a year or two into my search, one of my spies picked up a surge of magical energy, and followed it into the very depths of Munchkinland. I was expecting a spring of natural thaumaturgy, an old storehouse of artefacts being unearthed, perhaps even some ancient sorcerer dying. Imagine my surprise when the spy reported that the source of the surge had been a little girl crying by her mother's deathbed." **That mischievous smile blossomed again. **"Rather surprised by this turn of events, I had my operatives to watch the child while I followed the reports of her existence all the way back to her conception. The circumstances were curious to say the least, but there was no sign of any particular enchantment placed upon the girl or anything of that nature. I was starting to think that the incident had been a fluke when there was another surge: the girl had been bullied; names had been called, attention had been drawn to the girl's… rather unique skin colour; the altercation ended with the bully's hair spontaneously combusting, as I recall. So, intrigued, I doubled the watchers."**

"You… you were spying on me?"

"**No, I merely assigned a few of spies to keep an eye on you. Quite different."**

"_No it isn't!"_ Elphaba shouted. "You were _watching me_, and the fact that you were doing so through somebody else's eyes doesn't change a thing! And I can already tell that you kept it up, by the way- you don't need to tell me that you watched me all through my childhood."

"**Oh, not **_**constantly. **_**I was mainly wondering just how you were generating so much magic, so I was always keeping one spy's eye out for another surge. After a few sightings, I could tell that you were immensely powerful. The trouble was, I had no idea how I could put that power to use. So, I once again played the waiting game. You grew up, you learned to suppress the involuntary surges of magic that came with every angry impulse, you devoted yourself to protecting your little sister. And then you went to Shiz, and everything changed: you learned how to truly control your powers; Madame Morrible wasn't the only one impressed at your displays in magic class. I was excited, to say the least… and so disappointed when you went to the Emerald City. First, I lost sight of you behind the walls of the city; then, after you declared war on the Wizard- at just the time I thought you might be ready to recruit- you proved **_**so**_** elusive! You were always flying just out of reach, always sleeping as far from major settlements as possible, always leaving just before my spies tracked you down. Eventually I started to wonder if you were too powerful to be contained, if my attempt to acquire you would only result in failure."**

"Is that why you never sent any of your warriors to capture me in the last week or so?"

"**Exactly. But- and this is the point I've been driving towards- not too long before you met your apparent death, I found something rather strange: around the time you held that last meeting with your dear sister, there was another massive surge in power… and then, all of sudden, the spies began reporting **_**two**_** magical signatures in the area: one from you, and one from Nessarose. But when the Wicked Witch of the East finally died, the signature didn't die with her- it was **_**transferred**_** to Dorothy Gale of Kansas. Over the course of those tumultuous last few days, I watched and waited as the drama unfolded, as you and Glinda shared that tearful farewell, as you faked your death and left the ungrateful Land of Oz behind. And then one day, Dorothy Gale left Oz as surely as you and the Wizard did. Unlike the Wizard, she didn't fall… but the source of the newfound power **_**did- right into my outstretched hands!"**_

Laughing, he leaned back in his chair and propped both roughly-humanoid feet up on the desk; immediately, the room was bathed in an unsettling red glow that turned the deep red marble of the walls and furniture pitch-black. Magic swept across the room, sparking against metal decorations, rippling the air and setting Elphaba's teeth on edge; even as she felt the energies permeating her very bones, she realised that the power currently forming ice crystals on her skin was still dormant; _this_ was the proverbial eye of the storm. It terrified her… but at the same time, it felt instantly familiar.

And, as she turned to look at what the Nome King was wearing on his feet, she realised that she _had _indeed encountered this power before.

After a year without knowing what had become of them, Elphaba was now staring at the Ruby Slippers.

* * *

Has the Nome King truly lost his mind? What power do the long lost Ruby Slippers hold? What could the King possibly offer Elphaba in return for her services? Find out next chapter!


	26. No Bad Deed Goes Unrewarded

A/N: Here we are, ladies and gentlemen, the latest chapter. It's been a joy to write, and I can only hope that you have as much fun reading it as much as I did writing it. In the meantime, I've been reading your reviews, and I must say, they've all been very encouraging.

I'm glad you think the story's epic, Town, and truth to be told, I'm just grateful that I've managed to rack up at least thirty-eight reviews.

GoodWitchesOfOz, I appreciate your honesty, and I'm glad you've enjoyed the story so far. Hopefully, this chapter- without the chainsawing that the previous one was subjected to- will be up to standards.

I hope you enjoy Elphaba's reaction, Wile E Coyote.

And to Anna Marie Raven... I was _so _tempted to have Elphaba get snarky about exactly that issue. But then, I've never been good at those kinds of jokes, and I couldn't figure out a way of working one into the conversation without it seeming out of place.

So, without further ado, read, review and enjoy!

Disclaimer: I own nothing of Wicked, the Wizard of Oz, Return to Oz, or anything of the Oz franchise that happens to influence me.

* * *

For a moment, Elphaba sat, frozen with disbelief at the sight of the Ruby Slippers glittering ominously on the ends of the Nome King's monolithic feet.

Then, she lunged.

Flinging herself at the King with all her might- and what little magical power she could draw on- she leapt towards the Ruby Slippers. She wasn't sure how she was going to actually get them off the King's feet, or what she was intending to do with the Slippers once she had them, or even if either attempt would work; in that moment, her mind was empty except for a seething miasma of rage, not just because this blood-drooling megalomaniac was currently wearing the very shoes that had been stolen from her sister's corpse, but because of every other atrocity that had preceded this moment: the kidnapping of Glinda and Fiyero, the destruction of Oz, the murder of Curter and Rasp, the revelation that he'd been _spying on her _from childhood into adulthood, and now this- a personal insult on top of a long string of injustices. All she could think of in that mind-incinerating instant was of taking the Ruby Slippers back and hammering the King into gravel.

And she _flew_: for a split second at the most, gravity forgot all about her as she launched herself across the room and over the Nome King's desk. In that moment, the Ruby Slippers were within arm's reach; she actually felt her fingernails glance off their bejewelled surface- and then an ethereal hand rocketed out of nowhere and swatted her away. Astonishingly, she landed right back in her seat, enraged, but otherwise unharmed.

"**There's really no need for that, Elphaba,"** the King admonished gently, lowering the Slippers out of sight.

"You _THIEF!"_ Elphaba screamed. "You avaricious, genocidal, grave-robbing_ bastard!"_

"**I stole nothing; I merely recovered what Dorothy Gale lost."**

"Oh, and that somehow makes everything better, does it? You'd have gladly stolen them if you'd had the chance!" She let out a snarl of barely-restrained fury. "And I case I actually need to make this any clearer to you," she hissed, "I've spent the last year wondering what became of those Slippers, hating myself for allowing the only existing memento of my sister to slip through my fingers … when all along, you've been hoarding them!"

"**Were they really the only existing memento?" **the King asked; his voice sounded genuinely curious. **"You spent almost every waking hour caring for Nessarose before you went to Shiz; you knew of almost everything she treasured, and you knew where it would have been stored in the family home- you might have even been able to find something that brought back fond memories of your beloved sister. Instead, you chose the Ruby Slippers, a gift she never thanked you for and never really appreciated- in fact, the very representative of the last time you ever spoke to one another: an argument. So tell me, do you want to remember your sister, or do you want to remember your own misery?"**

Thanks to the sound of blood rushing through every single vein in her head at an intensity more commonly associated with horseraces, Elphaba couldn't hear what she said next: what little she could discern involved a long string of expletives and threats roared into the Nome King's face at almost point-blank range; it was all just meaningless noise to her ears, except for the rather welcome sound of her calling the King a "pathetic, flailing guesswork artist" and making bloodcurdling references to castration and molten lava. The fact that the King's expression didn't change throughout any of this explosive rant only made her angrier; at one point, she even tried to break the spells preventing her from using magic, to no avail. Eventually, though, she ran out of breath and insults, and collapsed back into her chair, growling furiously until her sense of hearing finally returned.

"**For what it's worth,"** said the King, gravely,** "I **_**am**_** sorry… but I couldn't just give them back to you, especially not after I unearthed their true power."**

It took a little while for Elphaba to voice a coherent response, as she'd just about screamed her throat raw. After a few seconds, though, she managed to whisper, "That has to be about the flimsiest excuse I've ever heard in my entire life. And while we're about it, _what_ true power? I enchanted those Slippers to let Nessarose walk; nothing more, nothing less."

"**On the contrary, I think you gave them a great deal more than you intended: after all, I remember that these shoes were once plated with silver. Rather strange that a spell designed to let a cripple walk would turn silver into rubies."**

"So? The spells of the Grimmerie aren't the most reliable in the world; maybe I garbled the incantation a little bit-"

"**The spell had nothing to do with it. The power that these Slippers now contain was yours and yours alone."**

"But that's impossible! I couldn't have-"

Elphaba's rationalizations were drowned out by the King's laughter. **"Oh, you poor, self-doubting child," **he said, pityingly. **"You truly have no idea just how powerful you are."**

"But-"

"**You always overdo things when you're under stress: you sprang to the defence of a single lion cub- and put a whole classroom into a frenzy; you were anxious to please the Wizard, so you gave Chistery wings- and extended the spell to an entire flock of his brothers, who you didn't even know about at the time. Is it really so surprising that your attempt to help your darling sister resulted in some of the most powerful artefacts in recorded history? In the end, you were so desperate to give Nessa the chance to walk that, as you spoke the words of the spell, you accidentally infused the slippers with a fragment of your own intrinsic power."**

And against all expectations, Elphaba realised that this made a disturbing amount of sense: thinking back to that tumultuous day, she remembered how just how tired she'd felt after casting the spell. In fact, by the time she'd left the house, she'd been seeing double; at one point, she'd almost blacked out in mid-air and had to stop for half an hour while she recovered. With no trustworthy doctors in reach, she'd been forced to soldier on until the fatigue passed, and in the chaos that had followed her visit to the palace, she'd forgotten all about it… until now. And that wasn't the only evidence in the King's favour, was there?

She found herself thinking back to just a few short days ago, when she and the refugees had sought shelter in the ruins of the family mansion: there, in the very study where the Ruby Slippers had been created and Boq had become the Tin Man, they'd found that massive hole in the wall, a crater that had clearly been there since before the place had been condemned. Both Rasp and Gnoll had believed it was a sign that Nessa had possessed magical powers, and after all her attempts at denying it, she now knew that they'd been right all along! She didn't even need to guess at how she'd made the hole: she'd been angry, guilt-ridden, and almost half-insane with loneliness and obsession, she'd just been abandoned by the man she loved _and _by her own sister, and if the magic of the Slippers really had been Elphaba's, all would have needed was one outburst- one scream of grief… and after seeing that power in action, what might she have done after that? Would she have tried to master it? What would she have planned to do with it? Would she have tried to make amends in some way? Would she have tried to hunt down Boq?

Or- if she'd survived the events of the next day- would she have become even worse than the Wizard?

Elphaba's subconsciousness, which had long since stopped responding to her desperate howls for mercy, immediately conjured up a vision of Oz conquered by Nessarose, a wasteland of ruined cities and endless deserts where the pitiful remnants of civilization lived in fear of the dreaded Wicked Witch of the East, the all-powerful itinerant madwoman who'd laid waste the country in her fruitless search for the Tin Man, even going so far as to kill her own evil sister in-

_Oh merciful gods and demiurges, I'm actually buying into the rumours they said about me and her. I've only been in the King's presence for a few hours and the bastard's already driven me half insane. Someone please kill me before it gets any worse._

Back in the present, the Nome King was still explaining himself:

"**I was only intending to use them to restore my lost powers- at first. But then I saw how the Slippers replenished themselves: for every mouthful of magic I consumed, a dozen more grew to replace it. And it didn't stop at regeneration either, for the energy you bestowed upon them was so potent that, now that it was unfettered by the frailties of a human body, it was actively growing in strength every day- and every hour, with the augmentations I performed. I expected to exhaust the Ruby Slippers' reserves by imprisoning the Wizard outside of our dimension; after all, it was something that I'd only done once, in my prime, and even then it had almost killed me. But no, there was always more, always more energy flowing through my body. Slowly, I began augmenting them further, conserving the energy, allowing it to build and purify until even the greatest sorcerers paled in comparison; we magicians can briefly defeat reality in our own small ways, but these artefacts can utterly **_**dominate it."**_

"You mean-"

"**Yes: the magic you infused the Slippers with is now so powerful, so concentrated, that reality itself now bends to the will of the wearer. Less than a few days after you created them, these humble shoes sent Dorothy Gale all the way home with a click of her heels. Can you imagine the power they can exert after a **_**year**_** of conservation and enhancement?" **The King laughed almost hysterically, and then calmed almost as suddenly. **"But there's a sting in the tail," **he announced soberly. **"I can't access their full potential, not as I am now; all of my experiments confirmed that, thanks to the rather messy collision of the original design and your enchantments, the Ruby Slippers work best for human wearers."**

Another piece of the jigsaw puzzle gently slid into place. "The Nome hybrids," Elphaba whispered. "You were trying to make them human enough to use the Slippers."

The King nodded solemnly.** "Lord Eldrect and his household were more than willing to sacrifice their lives; they'd been my allies since before my descent into solipsism. Unfortunately, even with the thimbleful of sheer power I'd managed to attain with the aid of the Ruby Slippers, the delicate transition from the inorganic to the organic was beyond me. The hybrids that resulted were sickly, barely-living creatures, too malformed in body and mind to even wear the Slippers, let alone wield them. For a time, I despaired, knowing that the power of effortless transformation was beyond my reach… but then, I remembered the Grimmerie; the incantations were undoubtedly complex, but the transformations that resulted were more than stable enough for my purpose. So, I convinced the War Council to invade Oz, promising them enough resources and riches to keep them occupied while I dealt with the Grimmerie; after all, with only a quarter of the Ruby Slippers' power unlocked, I'd be no match for all of them at once."**

"And because you didn't have time to learn its spells on your own before they returned, you captured Glinda and then me."

"**I hadn't originally intended to so in Glinda's case: up until I saw her in action, I was only going to use her as bait to draw you in. She put up quite a struggle when my forces attacked the Emerald City, even managed to use an Animation Spell on the fly, so I made her a deal and incorporated her into my plan-"**

"- In case I refused to take part," Elphaba finished. "Thank you _very _much for clearing that up. In that case, all that remains to be seen is just how long you're planning on torturing me until you give up, kill me, and settle for the Witch you've already fooled into working for you."

The King opened his mouth as if to speak. Then, he realised what Elphaba had just said. **"I'm sorry, what?" **he asked blankly.

"Well, if you've spent the last decade keeping an eye on me, and if you've questioned the Wizard, you'll know that I've learned my lesson: I do not make bargains with the enemy; I have ethics, standards, and maybe even a few badly-traumatized handfuls of pride. Furthermore, I've been subjected to enough attempts at temptation to know that you have absolutely no way of giving me what I want, either because you're a born liar or because you're so convinced that the Ruby Slippers can give you everything you ever wanted that you've lost interest in the facts. See, I know that there'd have been no way that the Wizard could have possibly made me into a hero after so many years of demonizing me, just as I know that you can't just use the Ruby Slippers to grant wishes. So, you'll fall back on torture, and because you don't have the time to break me, you'll eventually give up, kill me, and settle for Glinda. End of story."

"**Good grief, with your cynicism, I wonder how you can even get out of bed in the morning."**

"With your attitude, I wonder how you can sleep at night," Elphaba shot back.

"**Very funny. But in all seriousness, why do you think that I **_**wouldn't**_** be able to grant your wishes? What makes you think that these miraculous artefacts wouldn't be able to make your dreams come true?"**

"Because you're clearly a starry-eyed fantasist too busy daydreaming of utopia to even think about the real world; assuming that I _did_ turn those Slippers into self-sustaining magical generators, their power wouldn't be enough to transform an entire species, and it certainly wouldn't be enough to control reality itself. You know how I know that? Because, as you said, it's an offshoot of _my_ magic, and I know for a fact that I am not that powerful: even after all this time and all the purification you've supposedly put it through, my magic wouldn't be that powerful, nor would it be able to accumulate to the degree you're suggesting. I am not a demigod, I am not some kind of messiah- I'm just a fallible, limited human being; the only things that set me apart from the rest of Oz are my skin and a few intrinsic powers."

"**The key word in this speech being "limited," I assume?"** The King shook his head in disgust. **"It was bad enough hearing this self-despising monologue repeated by the spies I stationed at Kiamo Ko; hearing it from you in **_**person**_** is just depressing. I mean, once you'd escaped from Oz and found the time to recover from having your spirit broken, did it ever occur to you that you might actually be more powerful than you think?"**

"Just what I needed; assertiveness training from a megalomaniacal dictator," sneered Elphaba. "I mean, first the Wizard, now _you- _why does this keep happening to me? First of all, I'm not listening to you: this is just the prelude to you offering me the world. Secondly, after all the time spent pushing myself to the limit in fighting the Wizard- or you- I know for a fact that I've reached the uppermost pinnacle of my abilities, and it's not all that impressive."

This time, the King looked downright affronted. **"You are nowhere **_**near**_** the pinnacle- you're not even at the foothills!" **he exploded.** "I mean, Madame Morrible herself summoned a tornado that inhaled a house from another world, and she was decades past her prime when she did so! You outdid her several times over the course of your illustrious career!" **He took a deep breath, and thought for a moment. **"Just supposing," **he said,** "Just for the sake of argument- that when I gained full control of the Ruby Slippers, I really could give you everything you'd ever wanted. Isn't that worth at least discussing? I mean, it's not as if there's anything left to fight for, is there? Oz is dead; its cities have been destroyed and buried by the new growth; its people have been scattered from one end of the country to the other."**

"Thanks in no small part to _you_. You're not giving me much of a reason to accept this: I mean, if I was trying to convince a witch of just how trustworthy I was, I wouldn't mention just how many innocents I murdered, or how many people I dispossessed-"

"**You can kindly stop suggesting what you'd be doing in my shoes."** The dismissiveness in the King's voice was palpable. **"And you can also drop the moral posturing, thank you very much: had you not been shot down by Curter, you wouldn't have given a damn about the people of Oz; you left exile to rescue Glinda and Fiyero, and that was all you were concerned with, because you knew that the Animals would have been able to survive in the new wilderness. Even when you befriended the refugees, your heart wasn't really in it- do you remember that tantrum yesterday afternoon?"**

"That doesn't mean anything! Just because I lost my temper doesn't mean-"

"**Then why didn't you advise the refugees to gather more supporters? There would have been hundreds of Ozians roaming the forests that evening: you could have given the starving masses new purpose and bolstered the ranks of the freedom fighters; working in tandem, you and Curter might have found a way to arm all of them, and had you so chosen, hundreds of loyal freedom fighters could have soared into battle this morning! They might have crippled me, even killed me outright if there'd been enough of them- but no: you didn't want to expand the group beyond the few Ozian humans you had come to respect; accepting anymore would open you up to the hatred of the ignorant masses. And besides, you didn't have the time to mollycoddle Ozian fools: you wanted to rescue Glinda and Fiyero."**

There was a questioning silence.

"**I don't condemn you for wanting that, Elphaba: I know how much you love them. There's no shame in wanting to save those you love, just as there's no shame in accepting a bargain when there's literally no other option."**

"Alright then_,"_ Elphaba sighed. The sooner she got this nonsense over and done with, the better. "What could you _possibly_ offer me?"

"**Everything you've ever wanted, my dear. For example, I know you've been interested in starting a family, though of course Fiyero's- ahem- inorganic nature makes this impossible. Making your darling husband-to-be a human being again? Not a challenge to my new powers."**

"Your Highness, if you think I'm going to compromise my principles for the chance to get a bun in the oven, you can go to hell."

The infuriating smirk once again blossomed. **"I'm just getting warmed up, Elphaba. What would you think of a chance to live happily? Even after you left Oz, you never really attained true happiness: you had to worry about Fiyero being damaged or destroyed by wolves, by fire, by falling onto sharp rocks- his immortality makes him fragile; you had to worry about finding food, about keeping the villagers in the nearby towns from asking too many questions, and of course, about how Glinda was faring. If you so desired, I could allow you to live in a settlement of my own construction, inhabited by the resistance movement you befriended: Fiyero would be human again, you'd be given a comfortable home, and you'd be accepted by the community…"**

Elphaba considered this, if only in an attempt to gauge the King's sanity: most of the proposal had actually sounded possible; returning Fiyero to normality was a bit of a stretch, but the rest of it wasn't entirely outside the realms of what was possible. Building a settlement would be easy for someone with a reasonable grasp of the earthly magicks, and providing for the neighbours would be relatively easy as well. Maybe, with access to the Grimmerie, Fiyero _could_ be transformed back into a human; after all, Elphaba might been able to do that herself had she not decided to hand the Grimmerie over to Glinda.

"…**And, if you so wished," **the King added,** "Glinda would be there."**

_Alright, he's insane. Nevermind._

"And what would I say to her, exactly?" Elphaba snapped. "What would I say to her after all this time? "Oh, hi there, I'm sorry for faking my death and putting you through a hellish mixture of Ozian politics and Nomish prisons, but as you can see, it was _totally_ worth it!" What would I say to Fiyero? What would I say to the rebels? I don't think any of them could forget the fact that I ended up leading them into total failure!"

"**Memory is infinitely mutable; they'll remember only as much as you wish them to. If you wish, I could have Glinda's memories adjusted so that your faked death never happened; if you want, I could have the resistance believing that they succeeded in killing me, and they're living somewhere in rebuilt Munchkinland. And if your conscience gets the better of you, well, I think Curter would forgive you regardless."**

"Curter's dead, in case you've forgotten."

"**Death is no obstacle to the power of the Ruby Slippers."**

"And I can honestly say that you are the first and only person in recorded history to say those words with a straight face."

"**I'm being serious: if you so desire, I can easily resurrect the dead and restore them to full vitality without any negative symptoms. Madame Morrible, Doctor Dillamond, Nessarose, your parents- just say the word, and they'll back in the world of the living before you can blink**_**."**_

Elphaba very briefly hid her face behind her right hand in the universal gesture of exasperation, and asked, "Where are all the normal propositions? Usually around this time, I'd be offered fame, fortune, luxury, endless supplies of chocolate- that sort of thing."

"**In other words, everything the Wizard promised you, and everything you refused. I'd like to try a little originality, if you don't mind."**

"Just indulge me."

"**Fine: converting base metals into gold should be easy enough to provide fortune, providing you don't mind crashing an economy or two; endless supplies of chocolate likewise; as for luxury, what's your poison? Sun-parched shores, palm trees and beachside mansions of gleaming white marble? Golden palaces, sinfully decadent furniture, fine wine and armies of handpicked slaves ready to fulfil your every whim? Or just a basement full of drugs and a mattress? Different people have different ideas of luxury."**

"For someone who isn't even human, you've got a very firm grasp of human vices. And you still haven't mentioned fame."

"**You're already notorious, so I presume you want something more positive. If you like, I could engineer a situation in which you save the entire population of Oz, and you're accepted as their saviour, the foundation of a new and better society that would worship you for millennia after your death- and that's assuming you don't want immortality as well. Of course, if Ozian adulation doesn't appeal, I could create a society from scratch and program them to worship you as a goddess. I could go on, though I must admit, the other options all involve a lot of time travel."**

Somewhere deep inside Elphaba's mind, cynicism pressed an override button; out loud, she snapped, "Okay, that's enough: you might have fooled Glinda into thinking that you can turn back time, but you're not going to fool me: I don't care how much power you _think_ those Slippers have stored in them by now; they don't have the power to send you through time. Simple as that."

At that point, she should have left; she should have turned on her heel and walked out the door. But instead, she stood there and waited for the King to lose his temper again; and worse still, he didn't. He smirked and Elphaba could only listen in mute horror as the fateful words **"Perhaps a demonstration is in order?" **drifted across the room.

"No, it's not in order at all!" she shouted, flinging herself to the floor in a vain attempt to dodge the mountain-levelling explosion that would result from this starry-eyed twit's failed attempt at time travelling. "Do not try anything! _Do not try anything! _Do not-"

There was an eye-searing flash of red light, and the King vanished.

Eight long seconds passed before Elphaba finally worked up the nerve to stand up and investigate the vacant space where the King had once sat. Whatever he'd done, it obviously hadn't involved teleportation and judging by the faint traces of magic around the desk, he hadn't set off a flashbang and retreated back into the earth.

What if, against all known magical theory, the King had somehow managed to move through time?

If so, how was he going to demonstrate this newfound power? Was he going to bring back something from the past or the future? Or was he going to _change_ something?

And then, just as Elphaba was beginning to feel apprehensive, a white-hot needle of pain slammed into the base of her spine and rippled out across her skin, growing worse and worse with every inch it travelled. By the time the sensation had reached the tips of her fingers, she felt as though her skin was on fire; she couldn't be certain, for her eyelids had been forced shut by the burning that now coursed across her face. All she knew for sure was that every single nerve in her skin was practically alight with searing pain, and the sensation wasn't showing any sign of fading.

Through the seemingly endless haze of pain, she realised that whatever the pain was, it clearly had nothing to do with fire at all: she couldn't feel any kind of heat around her, and her clothes obviously hadn't burned away. Then, as she wondered what else could cause this, a new sensation arrived amidst the pain, and she let out a gasp of horror as she felt her skin begin to _change_: across her entire body, her very flesh was beginning to bubble and flow like liquid; unrecognizable shapesrose and fell from her now-molten skin as Elphaba's body underwent its own private metamorphosis.

What had the King done to her? What changes had he wrought upon history?

Forty agonised seconds later, the pain finally faded, leaving her half-collapsed on the floor, still alive… but undeniably different. Now, her skin felt inexplicably itchy and uncomfortable; more disturbingly, Elphaba had the distinct impression that it was actually _loose _in places.

Looking down at her hands, she found that, to her amazement, the very texture of her skin had changed: where it had once been smooth and relatively unblemished, now it was covered with tiny reptilian scales. And it didn't stop at her hands either; a cursory examination revealed that her entire body was covered in the delicate snakeskin. And all of it itched; it rasped and itched and tickled at every nerve until all Elphaba wanted to do was scratch.

There was another flash of ruby-coloured light, and suddenly the King was sitting behind his desk once again, looking very smug indeed.

"What did you do to me?" Elphaba demanded, trying not to let the fear and irritation in her voice show. The itching was almost unbearable now; indeed, the only thing stopping her from taking a fingernail to it was the irrational fear that her entire skin might just slough off if she tried.

"**I bestowed a few reptilian traits on you," **the King explained. **"It's a comparatively minor change, historically speaking."**

"But why am I…. itching?"

"**A side-effect of your new attributes: you're on the verge of moulting."**

"I'm _what?"_ Inside Elphaba's head, some long-forgotten rumourmonger whispered _"I hear she can shed her skin as easily as a snake!"_

"**Moulting- it's a very common habit of snakes, lizards and other-"**

"I _KNOW _WHAT MOULTING IS!" Elphaba roared, scratching furiously at her left arm. "I've read enough books on the subject to know about skin shedding, but how am I supposed to go about it? I need to do it _now_ or I'm going to go insane!"

"**I wouldn't recommend rubbing your head against a stone; use your fingernails."**

"How the hell do you know that's going to work?"

"**Because it always **_**has**_** for you,"** said the King, voice brimming with confidence. **"In the meantime, shall I allow you some privacy? This isn't something you can do fully-clothed."**

Elphaba was too discomforted to be angry, so she just nodded. Immediately, four opaque wooden panels materialised around her, shielding her from view. As an afterthought, a mirror was added to the ensemble, presumably so she could admire her new self. Elphaba barely even looked at it. As soon as she was certain that absolutely no-one could see her through the walls of the improvised changing room, she shed first her clothes and then her skin: it took ten humiliating minutes of scratching and tearing and worrying at the masses of dead scales, and by the end of it, her fingernails felt as though they were about to drop off, and she was blushing so furiously she thought she might spontaneously combust.

But, at long last, the last patch of dead skin fell away, and she breathed a sigh of relief as the itching finally stopped. Her new skin was tauter and more colourful than the old, and the scales seemed to glisten in the pale lighting of the office; it was at once disturbing and eerily fascinating, to the point that Elphaba almost considered admiring herself in the mirror. But in the end, she didn't: she put her clothes back on, still fuming with embarrassment, finishing by kicking the nearest panel to the ground and sitting back down in her chair in a huff.

"That," she snarled, as the changing room disintegrated behind her, "was just plain immature."

"**Don't look at me; I just added a few extra ingredients to the Green Elixir. Besides, you've had more than enough time to get used to moulting."**

"What the hell are you talking about? I've never moulted before in my life."

"**Yes, you have; don't you remember?"**

Elphaba was about to answer "of course not!" when a veritable avalanche of memories swept into her brain, flooding her consciousness with information: hundreds upon thousands of scenes were slowly incorporated into her personal history, all of them detailing the impact that her reptilian traits had had on her life. Immediately, she understood why the King had called the alteration "minor": after all, her green skin had already branded her as a freak and an outcast- the addition of scales would have barely made the slightest bit of difference, except in making that long-forgotten rumour come true. However, from all the years of moulting that had been added to her memory, a few inexplicably stuck out: some were childhood recollections of being yelled at by her father for leaving shed scales around the house, others were more recent ones of frantically worrying about having to burn the skin so the witch-hunters couldn't use it to pick up her trail; by far the strangest (and most embarrassing) of the new memories was from her days at Shiz, when Glinda had quite unexpectedly burst into their dormitory just as Elphaba had finished moulting. Much blushing and promises never to speak of the incident again had followed.

Back in the present, the King chuckled, **"I take it that your scepticism has been well and truly dispelled."**

She sighed; it was obvious that, whatever the King had done to her, it didn't involve transmogrification _or_ any deliberate memory alteration. And if this _did_ mean that the Ruby Slippers were as powerful as suggested, then the Nome King was an even bigger threat than she'd heretofore suspected.

"Fair enough," she grumbled. "You've convinced me. But can you get rid of the scales, now? As interesting as this is, I'd rather not spend the rest of my life sloughing off my skin twice a month."

"**As you wish." **With another flash of red light, the King disappeared back into the murky realms of the past, leaving Elphaba to suffer the pain of her own history being completely reformed for the second time that day.

Once she was able to open her eyes again, she found that her skin had returned to its usual texture (making this probably the only time in her entire life she'd ever been happy with her natural appearance), and the cast-off husk of her old snakeskin had vanished, having presumably ceased to have ever existed. Eventually, the memories of her "other self" vanished, too- thank goodness. By the time the Nome King reappeared, Elphaba was well and truly back to normal.

"**So, now that you no longer doubt these marvellous artefacts, tell me, now that you have nothing to lose and everything to gain… what do you want?"**

"Nothing," she said flatly.

"**And I can tell you're lying, by the way."**

"I'm not interested in anything you have to offer."

"**Another lie."**

Elphaba bit her lip; the King, infuriatingly enough, was absolutely right: she _was_ interested in his proposition- who _wouldn't_ be interested? But she couldn't accept the bargain: it would mean sacrificing her principles, her dignity, and the lives of every surviving human being in Oz; after all, the King was still out for Ozian blood, and while Elphaba still resented the citizens for accepting the Wizard's propaganda so blithely, she wasn't prepared to see them dead in exchange for her own happiness.

_Or are you?_

She hastily swept the molecule of temptation aside; she couldn't start thinking like this, not now- she had to keep her composure.

"**Do you know what I promised Glinda?"** The King's voice was a silken purr, now. **"More than anything else in the world, she wanted to go back to the day you first began your rebellion against the Wizard; she believed that all the hardships you suffered were due to her refusal to join you that day, you see. But what if you could share in her reward? Wouldn't you relish the chance to battle the Wizard again- but alongside your dearest friend, both of you equipped with all the magical knowledge you now possess?"**

"And how do I know you'll honour your end of the bargain? For all I know, the moment you've achieved ultimate power, you'll just stab me and Glinda in the back, or imprison us in the palace for all eternity!"

"**What would be the point of either? Killing the two of you would be a pointless waste, and as for imprisoning you… well, no offence intended, but I will actually have more important things to do than keep the two of you hanging around."**

"Then why would you send us back in time when we'd be in the perfect position to stop you from invading Oz in the first place?"

"**Control over reality extends to control over time, remember? Once I have the full power of these artefacts under my control, I'll be beyond the very reaches of history itself- as will anything else I desire. But it's nice to know you're considering what I have to say."**

"I'm not considering anything!"

"**I suppose not: you're too busy lying to consider much at all. And the thing is, Elphaba, you're a very bad liar, especially when your intended target is yourself. So, I'll ask you again: what… do… you… **_**want?"**_

"For the last time," Elphaba all but shouted, _"I don't want anything from you! _I told you- I've learned my lesson: no reward would be worth the price I'd have to pay!"

There are very few expressions that honestly seem to say more than the owner possibly could; at that very moment, the Nome King was wearing a very faint half-smile that seemed to shout "I was just _waiting_ for you to do that, and you didn't disappoint. Well done. Would you like your ignominious defeat served with triumphant gloating or with despair-inducing silence?"

Out loud, the King said, **"Allow me to show you exactly **_**what**_** you'd be sacrificing by accepting this bargain..."**

And before she could stop him, there was another eye-searing flash of crimson light as he once again disappeared back into the past.

A nerve-wracking silence followed; in the absence of anything better to do, Elphaba wondered what the King was going to change about her this time- assuming that was what he intended to do, anyway. What had he meant, exactly? How was he going to show her what she'd be sacrificing? _What_ did he think she'd sacrifice, anyway?

_Okay, calm down, Elphaba; you already know that he's at least mildly unhinged as well as impossibly powerful, so there's no real point in worrying when you know that he's absolutely guaranteed to do something horrible. You just have to wait and hope that whatever he has in mind isn't too debilitating._

Fourteen seconds went by, and nothing happened.

Elphaba's mind, deprived of anything sane to focus on, began thinking of all the horrors that the Nome King could be committing upon her past; after all, she'd refused every single offer he'd made so far- maybe he was going to try and torture her into working for him. And maybe, _just maybe_ he'd decided that the best way to go about this was by incorporating only the most distorting teratogens into the formula of the Green Elixir, reducing Elphaba's body to a tumorous jumble of distended limbs and withered features, a creature without eyes and incapable of speech thanks to the lipless mouth and flesh-rending teeth… but the torture wouldn't be from the sight of these deformities, or even from the pain that they'd no doubt infuse her body with; no, the true torture would arrive when the memories of her new self arrived in her brain: after all, would this version of herself have ever met Glinda or Fiyero? Of course not! She wouldn't have even been allowed to associate with Nessa! This version of Elphaba would have been locked in the attic for most of her childhood, subsisting on rats and lichen until her first magical outburst smashed the house into matchsticks, and sent her rampaging across the countryside, a monster to rival anything conjured up by the Wizard's propaganda department.

_Calm down, calm down- it might not be exactly like that; he might just be seeing if he can- _

This time, Elphaba couldn't hold back a scream. If anything, the pain was even worse: the feeling of being burned alive had been replaced by the awful tearing and wrenching of being flayed and dismembered. Worse still, it wasn't followed by any sensations of her body changing or mutating; for the next minute, all she felt was a profound and agonising sense of loss.

Much later, she learned that the pain she felt was essentially an echo of whatever changes the King was making to her personal history, the logical consequences of having her body _and_ almost three decades of her life restructured. At the time, though, all she knew- indeed, the only coherent thought she could form at that moment- was that she was closer to dying now than at any point in her life. Somehow, this had managed to outdo literally every other brush with death that she'd experienced in her life; all the bullets she'd intercepted (about five, thanks to Ozian snipers), all the knife wounds she'd managed to withstand, all the times she'd nearly fallen from her boom- _this_ was the very brink of death. If she were to black out now, there'd be no waking up again.

So she clung to her consciousness like a shipwrecked mariner might cling to a piece of flotsam, until the pain finally faded, leaving her collapsed on the floor, exhausted and aching, but somehow still alive. For what felt like centuries, she lay there, dead to the world; then, the Nome King reappeared, smiling triumphantly down at her. And why wouldn't he be smiling? After all, his handiwork was on display, now.

She was about to ask what he'd changed about her this time, when she realised that she couldn't feel the presence of any crippling mutations; no mismatched limbs, no patchwork skin, no secondary mouths. She didn't _feel_ different, and her body certainly didn't look different from what little she could see of it. What _had_ the King changed?

Groaning in exhaustion, she slowly clambered to her feet; but as she tottered upright, she instinctively reached out to grab the back of the chair so as to steady herself- and in that moment, she realised what had been done to her, for she had a clear view of her right hand:

It was no longer green-skinned.

Somehow, she'd...

She'd…

The King's smile grew. Without saying a word, he idly waved a hand through the air, producing a large mirror so brilliantly polished it looked more like a sheet of platinum from a distance, and with another gesture, he sent it floating towards Elphaba.

By now, she knew what to expect, but that didn't stop her heart from skipping a beat when she looked into the depths of the mirror, and saw a face bereft of green.

Once upon a time, every single fantasy she'd ever had would end with her being made normal and accepted by others; once, she'd toiled and slaved throughout her college days just for the chance to meet someone who could "degreenify" her, as she'd called it; she'd even searched the pages of the Grimmerie itself for a spell that could cleanse her unnatural skin colour. Of course, the dreams never came to pass, the Wizard turned out to be a fraud, and her attempts at enchanting her skin were invariable too dangerous to properly implement. In the end, Elphaba accepted the fact that the miracle she'd been hoping for would never happen, and got on with her life and the rebellion that had occupied it.

But somehow, after all the heartbreak, disillusionment and resignation... she was finally normal.

The face that gazed back at her from the mirror was as pale and smooth as carved ivory; high, delicate-looking cheekbones and a somewhat pointed chin; a long, slender nose; large dark eyes, wide with amazement and fear; a thin-lipped mouth open in an astonished gape... to Elphaba's eyes, her face almost looked pretty.

No, more than that.

"_Why, Miss Elphaba,"_ Glinda had said, _"Look at you: you're beautiful."_

"**Not such a terrible sacrifice at all, is it?"** the King said quietly. **"When all's said and done, the only thing you'd have to give up is your own unhappiness."**

"I…" Elphaba swallowed hard, and tried to force her voice to work again; she had to say no to this bargain, she had to keep to her principles; she had to think of all the people who'd have died for nothing if she accepted- and of all the people who _would_ die. But it was so hard to even remember why she was fighting this uphill battle when one of her oldest and most heartfelt wishes was staring her in the face.

"I… I… I'm not going to give in just because you've made me look normal," she managed to say. "If you think all I need to make me happy is a new face, you've-"

"**Of course I don't. If I wanted to drain the pigmentation from your skin, I wouldn't need to waste time changing the past; no, your new form isn't the only gift I have to offer- and you know it. Now remember, if you will, the life you've always wanted…"**

And before she could even think of stopping it, before she could try and brace herself for the impact, another lifetime of memories flooded her unprepared mind. But unlike the memories of her reptilian self, they didn't merge seamlessly with her old recollections; instead, all the old memories were unceremoniously shoved aside, allowing the new to assume their place. And over the course of the next few minutes, Elphaba found herself sporadically _forgetting:_ for moment at time that seemed to last infinity, she'd forget everything that she'd once been: the last few days among the rebels, the Invasion of Oz, faking her death, falling in love with Fiyero, her time as the Wicked Witch of the West, that first visit to the Emerald City, befriending Glinda, attending Shiz, even the fact that she'd once had green skin- all of it was wiped from existence, and replaced with the history of her new self.

For the rest of those times, when her original identity remained intact, she could only watch as choice visions of her rebuilt life played out before her mind's eye.

There were no painful childhood memories here, no recollections of being locked in her bedroom or slapped across the face for trying to leave the house, of being yelled at by her father while mother sat in silence, apathetic and withdrawn; in her past, the house never seemed dark or oppressive, and nobody ever shouted at her for trying to speak to them. In fact, the very first memory she recalled was one of being hugged, and her mother's voice echoing soothingly overhead. The happy memories didn't stop there, either: she saw her father smiling proudly as he watched her, seated on the library floor, lost in one of the largest books in the room; she saw family outings, celebration after celebration, and seemingly endless praise from both her mother and father… There were even visions of going to school and being accepted, if not adored: after all, not everyone wanted to be friends with the governor's daughter.

And the happy memories continued spiralling into her brain, every single one a thousand times as joyous and treasured as the last; even the birth of Nessarose didn't seem to tarnish the joy of this Elphaba's past, nor did being entrusted with Nessa's safety when she left the house or on her first day at school. After all, that was the day she manifested her powers- first in finding the brat who'd stolen Nessa's schoolbag, tracking him down with the kind of intuition that only magic could offer; then, when the roof of the decrepit main hall collapsed, sheltering the crowd below with a blast instinctual magic. Elphaba remembered the aftermath of that day, of being hugged by Nessarose and being told, again and again, "You saved me!" She remembered the odd mixture of fear and pride and relief that her parents had displayed; neither of them were sure what to make of their eldest child's mysterious powers, but for the most, they were just happy that the two had returned unharmed. Most of all, Elphaba remembered the exhilaration she'd felt; she couldn't tell if it was an aftereffect of her first magical outburst, or just happiness at having saved Nessa's life. And frankly, she didn't care.

The memories raced onwards: year after year of being privately tutored in magic, of learning and of triumph as her powers and her knowledge grew to eclipse those of her teacher, as she grew to love the sense of accomplishment that magical research and experimentation granted. Her parents, once unnerved by magic, now began to praise her achievements, boasting to the world of their eldest daughter's power. Her tutor- a spindly little character who'd once numbered among Madame Morrible's chosen few- suggested job opportunities, all of them grander than the last. And when she finally graduated from both high school and from private tuition, she was once again given a place at Shiz- not just as a student, but as _an assistant. _"It's a stepping stone to greater things," she was told. "Horrible Morrible might not look it, but she's got the ear of the Wizard; impress her, and the sky's the limit…"

So, she accepted. Four years of university followed; four years of teaching and toil, of one triumph being followed by yet another; of weird and eccentric friendships with all manner of people, from the resident occult scholar, "Lofty" Trapdamask, to the infamously ditzy Galinda Upland. Somehow, she managed to take the gaggle of misfits that had come to populate the magic class and transform them into qualified magicians. At the end of her final year, a letter arrived from the Wizard, requesting her presence _and_ that of her five best students- her apprentices in service to His Ozness's Government, as the letter put it. Elphaba, flushed with excitement, briefly interpreted this as her entrance into thaumaturgical research and development.

Somewhat unsurprisingly, all her hopes in this direction came tumbling down once she found herself actually standing before the Wizard, watching in disbelief as he stepped out from behind the Face and started outlining her new duties, which consisted of protecting the government from suspected "terrorist threats," ensuring that people retained their trust in Oz, and that was it.

Once again, instead of feeling awe and reverence, all she felt was disgust.

_This is who I've slaved and toiled over the last few years to work for,_ she thought bitterly,_ a con artist and a fraud without the slightest thimbleful of magical power. And we're supposed to just lie down and accept that everything we do is in the name of the public good… when Ozian schools are training magicians just so this clapped-out old bastard can take credit for what THEY do! Everything I've done in my life has been leading up to a life of servitude to this bastard; no individual research, no invention- just mercenary work for HIM! And what about all those rumours I've been hearing? What about the disappearances among the Animal populace? The cages? The talk of a secret police? Are they real? Are they his doing as well? Damn it, damn it, damn it…_

_But things have changed, haven't they? It used to be that the two or three magicians around here took orders only from the Wizard… but now, I've got at least five that take orders from _me.

_What if I could change things? What if revolution _is _possible?_

But that answer would never arrive, for back in the present, far beneath the mountainous territory of the Nomes, Elphaba was suddenly gripped by the searing pain of history twisting itself back into shape…

The return to consciousness was agonizing, to say the least; the other alterations to history had been painful to say the least, but if it had been bad enough to actually make her black out altogether, this one had to set some kind of record.

Head pounding, Elphaba clambered groggily to her feet, and found herself one again staring into the hovering mirror: once again, she knew what to expect, but that didn't stop her heart from sinking as she saw that her skin had returned to its original shade of green. Her original memories were back in place as well: the same abusive father, the same distant mother, the lonely past with only a few stubborn scraps of the implanted memories left to indicate that anything about it had ever changed at all.

Disappointment blossomed, and before she could stop herself, she found herself demanding, "Why did you change me back?"

"**Technically, I didn't," **said the King.** 'What you experienced was a paradox being eliminated. After all, history can tolerate a few minor additions, so long as they don't seriously distort the course of events; you already saw how altering the texture of your skin wouldn't have changed your past or your future. But giving you the appearance of a normal human being creates problems: you played a very important role in Ozian history, Elphaba, and changing your origins and motives was too much to the time-stream to tolerate. After all, in that version of history, you might have won the battle against the Wizard, and how would you have come to be here if that was so? Thus, a paradox forms and festers, before finally being healed by time's correcting hand, and you are returned to normal; only the full power of the Ruby Slippers can truly subvert causality, give paradoxes dimensions of their own in which to flourish. But then, I think it was appropriate that it ended when it did: I certainly can't think of a better point for you to assume your new life- if you want it that way."**

The King took a deep breath, and steepled his fingers on the desk. **"And so, we come to the crux of my offer: you stand to lose only your misery, your memories of sorrow and regret, and gain anything you could ever want. That alternate past I showed you just one possibility: you can ask for literally **_**everything **_**and get it; there are no limits to what you can ask for here. All you have to do is in payment is cast a single spell, and more to the point, you've dreamed of casting it a thousand times before on Fiyero; you know the chapter, you know the page- if you had the Grimmerie in front of you, you'd know the words. Just… one… **_**spell. **_**Now, tell me, Elphaba… do you accept?"**

"I… I don't want-"

The King waved a hand, and suddenly the memories of her other self were there again: visions of the happy childhood she'd never really had, now coursed through her brain; split-second glimpses of being embraced by her mother and father, of Nessa looking to her for help, of students who'd flocked to her door for help, of her apprentices standing beside her in the throne room and asking her if they could trust the Wizard… but the memories that her mind always instinctively returned to was from her other self's childhood, to all the times where she found herself being hugged and kissed by her parents.

She knew that none of it had ever really happened and she could never experience life as her alternate had, but a more sensible part of her knew that she was lying to herself. Of course it could happen: hadn't the last few minutes proved exactly that?

"**Don't you want the chance to be happy? Don't you want to enjoy the triumphs and joys that a new life would offer? Don't you want to experience everything that an ordinary human being would in their life? A loving family; the acceptance of others; acknowledgement of your gifts; the chance for success that you never had- don't you want that?"**

At that moment, Elphaba wanted to say that what she wanted wasn't important, that she wasn't interested in what he was suggesting; but she couldn't bring herself to speak, and anything she would have said would have been a pathetically transparent lie. As much as she hated herself for even considering it, but she _did_ want what was being offered; she'd wanted it for almost her entire life in some form or another.

"**You're going to have to answer me, Elphaba. I won't punish you for saying no; I won't torture you, I won't punish Glinda and Fiyero for your decision. All I want, here and now ,is your answer: yes, or no. What'll it be?"**

There was a silence that sounded like the collapse of mountains to Elphaba's stress-addled ears.

Then Elphaba took a deep breath, and made a decision she would never forgive herself for.

"You're right," she whispered; her tears were flowing freely now, and it took all of her self-control to keep her voice steady. "I _do_ want what you've offered me. I think I've wanted it ever since I was a child…"

The King smiled horribly.

"…but I can't accept it," she finished. "Not because I'd be betraying my principles or because I'd be abandoning anyone left behind in Oz… it's because I don't deserve it."

"**After all you've achieved, do you honestly think that?"**

"What _have_ I have achieved? Nothing! Everything I've tried to do in my life ended in failure, either because I was too stubborn or too stupid to act when I could have! My attempt to save the Animals? It failed, and was left to Glinda to accomplish. My attempt to overthrow the Wizard? That failed too, and Glinda accomplished it. My attempt to save Nessa didn't even get off the ground! My attempt to save Fiyero left him permanently crippled! And what about these last few days of trying to stop you, of trying to rescue Fiyero and Glinda? You've already made it clear just how badly that went. You may think I've got the potential to be all-powerful… but as far as I'm concerned, I don't have what it takes. I squandered every last drop of my potential years ago."

"**Does it matter whether you deserve it or not? You've suffered for every mistake that was made: you deserve everything that you saw in your other self's memories, including that chance at victory-"**

"_No I don't._ She had the same powers as me, the same intelligence; she put both to better use, she thought things through- she actually decided to _organise_ a revolution instead of just flying off the handle like I did. You say she would have been able to defeat the Wizard? She deserved that chance. I'm not that girl… and more importantly, I can't be."

For ten seconds, neither of them said a word.

Then, at last, the King said, **"As you wish." **There was no disappointment in his voice, no anger or irritation; just acceptance.

"So what happens now?"

"**You may return to your room and wait while Glinda finishes translating the Grimmerie. Simple as that. Just remember that your refusal doesn't have to be permanent: you can always change your mind later."**

"You're taking my refusal pretty damn well for someone who was banking on me doing all the work up until you saw Glinda in action."

The King smirked. **"Truth to be told, I was more concerned that you'd accept the bargain and use it as an opportunity to stab me in the back. But then again, I'm not too troubled: few things ever go entirely to plan. That's why it always helps to have an understudy or two on hand." **He winked cheekily. **"You can go, now."**

Elphaba stood, and realised she was shaking; taking a brief moment to gather her nerves, she began hobbling towards the exit. But as she neared the door, a thought suddenly struck her.

"Why did you need Mombi?"

"**Hmmm?"**

"This plan of yours, why did you need Mombi for it? If you needed someone to direct me to the Nome Dominions, then why use Mombi? Why use anyone? Painting directions on the side of the palace would have worked better. So why did you need to keep her around at all?"

"**That,"** said the King **"would be telling."**

"I'll be sure to think on this little mystery once I'm back in my cell."

"**Speaking of which, there's something I should probably give you to help pass the time…" **The King held up a hand, and his brow furrowed with concentration for a moment as energy slowly gathered in his palm. Over the course of the next second or two, the gathered energies shimmered and glittered and finally solidified into a single glass ball, which the King handed to Elphaba.

"**I took the liberty of chronicling your other self's memories. She led quite an interesting life, at least from what I saw; it's only one possible outcome from her decision in the Emerald City, but it's definitely an entertaining one. All you need to do to is look closely at the sphere. I hope you enjoy it…"**

* * *

Elphaba wasn't fooled.

She knew that she'd been given the memory sphere for the sole purpose of tempting her into changing her mind.

But then, so long as she actually knew that, it wouldn't hurt to look, would it?

Yes, she'd look- just for a little while. Just long enough to take another look at the memories, anyway. Just long enough to satisfy her curiosity.

And she wanted one last look at that wonderful childhood that had never really happened.

After all, she could give it up anytime she wanted, couldn't she?


	27. Trials

A/N: I'm so sorry that this latest chapter's arrived so late, ladies and gents; I've been swamped with work in the past week- and I made the mistake of playing Mass Effect 3 all the way to the end. I'll try to be a bit more prompt as always, but I'm sure you aren't interested in hearing explanations. So, without further ado, here's the latest chapter: read, review and enjoy!

Disclaimer: Wicked, Return to Oz, and the other parts of the Oz Franchise featured here do not, cannot and will not belong to me. Trust me on this.

* * *

An hour later, Elphaba was still watching her alternate life play out before her eyes.

All in all, she had to give the Nome King credit: the memory sphere was quite possibly the most insidious waste of time ever created, with the possible exceptions of covert alcoholism and voting. It didn't just display the cherished memories of her other self; it made sure Elphaba would keep watching through the simple fact that most of the memories faded almost as soon as she took her eyes off it. And because there was almost nothing else to do except stare at the ceiling and reflect on how badly things had gone, this little countermeasure kept her drifting back to the damnable sphere for more.

There _was_ one other thing she could be doing- in fact, what she _should_ have been doing from the moment she'd arrived back in her cell: trying to find a way out. She should have been off the bed and scouring the walls for weak spots and structural weaknesses from the word "go," seeing if she could loosen the shackles around her magic, planning ways of outsmarting the guards at the door. She should have been doing that… but every time she put the sphere down and started thinking about her approach, pessimism hit hard: three out of the four walls were solid bedrock, and while the fourth was thin enough to break through with a decent burst of concussive magic, it was the entrance- and guarded on the other size by at least six Nomes. The confirmed source of the anti-magic was several hundred yards out of reach, probably admiring himself in a mirror. The Nome guards had refused to speak to her, and were probably too unimaginative to be fooled anyway.

Worse still, every time she managed to sustain that initial surge of hope, the memory sphere seemed to detect it; more than once, it had actually switched itself off, leaving her without her cherished alternate memories and with absolutely _nothing _to do, except perhaps to agonize over everything that she'd forgotten- or worse, over how badly the last few days had gone. And when the sphere finally reactivated, she'd find herself reviewing the memories once again, wishing that she'd accepted the King's offer… and wondering what was stopping her from doing so right there and then.

So, what _was_ stopping her from accepting the bargain?

Indecisiveness?

Obstinacy?

Self-loathing?

_Probably all of the above, _she reflected.

Elphaba sighed, and held the memory sphere to her right eye again: she didn't want to think in this direction anymore. As a matter of fact, she didn't want to think at all. Right now, all she wanted to do was bury herself in memories and pretend she'd lived them. Afterwards, maybe she'd eventually give in and agree to the Nome King's terms, making these visions into reality; maybe she'd refuse.

At any rate, Elphaba was too tired to care what happened next- tired of her self-imposed mission, tired of the endless parade of failures, tired of losing her friends and loved ones…

And tired of being herself.

Wearily, she looked deep into the sphere, and dreamed she was someone better.

* * *

There was no way out.

Thanks to the spy, Basalt now knew everything that had been said and done in the conversation between Elphaba and the King; now, almost every secret that Roquat the Red had kept was unveiled. And now, Basalt was struggling with the conundrum of what to do, because no particularly option seemed acceptable in any way, shape, or form:

Siding with the King would mean allowing Nome society to collapse; every single living Nome would be forcibly ascended into an existence that they might not be able to survive; Basalt himself would be stripped of his duties and deprived of the chance to truly learn about emotion. Basalt's psyche automatically rebelled at the very concept of this option, and the magical bond he operated under refused to allow him any further thought in this direction.

Siding with the War Council- assuming he could find and reach them in time- would mean betraying the King and allowing the Generals to continue their abuse and subversion of Nome Society. In all likelihood, Glinda and all the other prisoners would be killed as soon as the Council's operatives finished questioning them; unless Basalt managed to prove himself worthy of their favour, he would no doubt be stripped of his duties and replaced by someone more loyal; worst of all, the Ruby Slippers would be confiscated and used to further the Council's ends. Again, unacceptable to every functioning part of Basalt's mind- including a few that insisted that the deaths of Glinda and Elphaba would be even worse than he'd first estimated.

Siding with Elphaba was a tempting option; after all, it offered the possibility of saving Nome society from any further degradation... but it would mean betraying everything he had ever known. In the likely event that helping Elphaba ended in failure, he'd be executed along with everyone else who'd assisted- including Glinda, if the King felt she was too troublesome to keep around. If this attempt succeeded, Basalt would once again be deprived of duty: he would have no place in whatever existence that Glinda could eke out, and his treason would result in him being stripped of his duties anyway. And that was assuming that Elphaba wanted his help in the first place; as a Nome, he was, for all intents and purposes, her enemy.

He looked down at Glinda, who was still fast asleep in bed, and found himself trying to think about the situation in terms of how _she_ would benefit: in the first option, she would be sent back in time to undo her "mistake." Not only did she have no guarantee of succeeding, but the task itself was completely pointless; Elphaba and Fiyero were still alive. In the second option, Glinda would be tortured for information and executed without trial, along with Elphaba, Fiyero, Woolwax, and the Wizard. In the third option, Glinda would either die, or be sent back in time without ever learning that Basalt had squandered his life and that of her best friend on a futile rebellion.

Again, none of the three sounded welcome, but unless he had overlooked something, there were no other possibilities.

No further options.

No solutions.

No way out.

It might not have been the first time in his existence that Basalt had idea what to do next, but it was certainly the first time that he'd felt completely useless.

* * *

"_Ferruseld Magnetifus Estrallivar Vekt… Ferruseld Magnetifus Estrallivar Vekt_ … _Ferru-_oh for God's sake!"

Oscar Diggs, formerly known as the Wizard of Oz, was not making much progress in his magical studies; having finally nailed down the basic principles of summoning and banishing bits of nearby metal, he was currently bogged down in trying to bend his piece of rusted old iron into a hook. By now, he knew it was a matter of thinking certain thoughts as he spoke the words of the spell, but somehow, he just couldn't get the metal to curve; was he thinking the wrong kind of thoughts? Was he mangling the words again? Or was the metal too rusty?

He threw the corroded old thing aside and thought furiously to himself; why was he even bothering? Nobody had entered the cell in almost an hour, and unless the Nomes were a lot fleshier than he remembered, he doubted that a jerry-rigged knife would pose much of a threat to an unsuspecting guard. And fashioning the bit of metal into a pickaxe was beyond ridiculous: with his arms so badly twisted out of shape it was hard to lift anything heavier than the average pool cue, and even if he could manage to chip his way through the entrance, he'd be escaping into the King's Palace, where he'd be recaptured in less than a minute.

In the back of his mind, indignant little voice snapped, _so you're rubbish at the only spell you've learned so far- so what? You've got to keep trying, and you've got to figure out a way of helping Elphaba, too; you've got to redeem yourself, you've got to earn her forgiveness, and you've got to earn the right to be called her father- remember? You've got to keep trying, and you've got to keep thinking of a way to help your daughter, otherwise your only chance to make things right is going to go spiralling down the plughole._

Diggs sighed wearily; he was halfway through bending down to pick up the scrap of metal, when he remembered his past lessons, and with a whisper of the incantation, the length of rusted iron was sitting in his hand once again. Trying to make the most of the brief surge of hope that resulted, Diggs began chanting the words of the spell again, once more trying to bend his knife into a hook.

Secretly, he hoped that whatever chance to make things right was due to arrive sooner rather than later, because he was seriously beginning to wonder if he could be of any use to anyone…

* * *

Woolwax had been in tight situations before.

He'd been thrashed half to death by his instructor for operating a still behind the barracks; he'd been shot no less than eighteen times in the line of duty (sometimes even by enemy troops); he'd almost been killed in a cart crash on his first day after retiring; he'd been attacked by quite a few petty crooks who thought that the only Munchkin in the street would be an easy target; he'd even had to fight his way out of his hometown when the Nomes had invaded. Every single incident he'd survived, and he'd ended up a leathery, battle-scarred mess for it, but the fact that he was alive at all was pretty encouraging.

This was something different altogether: he was currently sitting in a heavily-cushioned cell, trussed up in a straightjacket; his mouth was clamped shut with a muzzle, his legs strapped to the floor, and Woolwax scarcely dared to even think about the so-called toilet that the Nomes had set up. For the first hour after the sedatives had worn off, he'd been trying to chew through the restraints; after that, he'd tried getting the attention of the Nome guards, which didn't work because "Loosen these straps, I need to scratch my ass!" was rendered incoherent by the gag, as was "Untie me if you think you're so tough!" and "Fine, _don't_ untie me- I'll headbutt you to death, you cowardly little shits!"

But it wasn't the guards that _really_ pissed him off, or the restraints, the prison, the biologically invasive toilet facilities, or even the fact that he'd been staring at the wall for the past hour or so with nothing else to do but grumble to himself. It was the fact that he was within _walking distance_ of Glinda- the woman who'd done more for Munchkinland than any other Ozian ruler in the past century, the hero that he and a dozen other refugees had set out to rescue- and he couldn't do a goddamn thing to help.

All he could do was sit there and glower, trying not to go completely insane.

And so far, he wasn't having much success.

* * *

Moleburr was dead.

It had taken him half an hour of trying vainly to revive him to acknowledge this fact, but there was no denying it now: Vadkin Moleburr- his business partner, his advisor, his mentor, his only friend- was lying dead at his feet. Brollan had told himself so many times that this couldn't be true, that someone as careful as Moleburr couldn't just _die_ so suddenly_…_ but now that he'd dragged the lifeless body over a mile of plateau, he couldn't keep reality at bay.

Could he have done something? If Brollan hadn't been piloting the carpet, would Moleburr have survived? If Brollan hadn't wasted so much time arguing with the Witch, if hadn't been such a _child_, would she have been able to rescue them?

Had Moleburr known he was going to die? Brollan's mind raced, trying to remember his friend's expression in the moments leading up to the crash: as far as he could remember, he hadn't seemed terribly frightened, or even slightly concerned, for that matter; he'd looked blankly stoic as always, right up to the minute where that last jolt had flung them from the carpet.

But then again, he'd always been stoic. In fact, the only time Moleburr had ever shown strong emotion was after he'd gotten into a very public fight with one of their stockholders; that time, he'd been genuinely angry enough to actually slap Brollan across the face and demand that he act his age for the rest of the conference. At the time, Brollan hadn't thought much of it, but now the event seemed to take on a life of its own as fresh guilt flooded his brain, and he remembered with newfound horror the moment in which Moleburr had all but shouted, _"What is _wrong_ with you? Do you take nothing seriously?"_

"_Look, I know what I'm doing-"_

"_No, you don't! _You are a child in an adult's body_; you haven't the faintest idea of what you're doing or the most basic consequences of your actions!"_

And now, months after that brief explosion of rage had been ignored and forgotten about, Brollan realized that his friend had been right; if only it hadn't taken Moleburr's death to hammer the point home!

So, still crying and still ashamed of himself for doing so, he'd dragged Moleburr all the way back to the crash site, where the Nomes would no doubt be waiting for him; as far as he was concerned, facing down imprisonment or execution was infinitely preferable to wandering the barren plateau for the rest of his life, with only his guilt and the corpse of his best friend for company.

It took perhaps an hour, and by the time the familiar blood-streaked recess in the ground came into view, he could clearly see that the Nome King and whatever forces he'd brought with him had long since departed; in their wake, they'd left the wreckage of the carpets and the bodies of those who'd been killed in the crash. Obviously, the others had been captured almost as soon as the King's hands closed over them. The one exception lay in a heap of charred limbs, burned almost beyond recognition. Despite these injuries, it was pretty clear that the body didn't belong to the Witch; it was Munchkin height.

With little else to do, Brollan found himself slowly gathering the corpses into one large heap; it just didn't seem right to leave them out for the crows, and what with the plateau being solid rock as far as the eye could see, cremation seemed to be the only way to disposing of the bodies- once he found something flammable, of course.

Once he was finished, he sat down heavily, put his head in his hands, and wondered what the merry hell he could possibly do now: the Nomes had gone, leaving him stranded on this godforsaken plateau with a neat choice between trying to leave and staying forever. The first option was impossible: he didn't know the territory, he didn't know if he could escape across the Deadly Desert- and he didn't even know what direction he'd have to take to do so. And as for staying, it'd kill him: there was no shelter, no water, no food…

Actually, there _was_ food… it was all around him, in fact-

He nearly threw up. Why would he even _think_ about something like that? No, no, he'd rather starve to death than eat Moleburr- or any of the other dead refugees, for that matter. Besides, the crash site was strewn with luggage: there had to be something edible amongst the wreckage.

Staggering to his feet, Brollan reached out and grabbed the nearest bag, a heavy knapsack the colour of soot: as he clumsily opened it, he found himself staring into a small ocean of occult paraphernalia: reinforced vials of luminous fluids and solutions, heavy leather-bound books with titles written in indecipherable text, pendants and talismans carved with mystic runes... This bag had obviously belonged to the Witch; wherever she was now, the Nomes hadn't wanted her keeping any of her magical supplies on hand.

Scanning the clutter, Brollan's eyes alighted on a tiny notebook wedged between a rack of steel-framed test tubes and a book on thaumaturgical physics: amongst all these other curiosities, it would have gone unnoticed had it not been for the label that had been etched into the cover- "Useful Grimmerie Spells." Plucking the thing from its niche, Brollan leafed through the notebook for a while, looking for anything that might be useful; for several minutes, he plunged through the records and definitions of all the spells that the Witch had recorded, noting the well-thumbed pages and smudged handwriting along the way. Obviously, these were spells she'd found the most useful in her time she'd spent hellraising across Oz, but was there anything here that could help _him?_

And then a title leapt out at him: "SPELL OF PHYSICAL HEALING (rough translation)."

Curious, Brollan scanned the page: _"Useful,"_ the Witch had written just below the words of the spell. _"Unstable as all Grimmerie spells, but at least risks are worth taking; according to Grimmerie and own experience (ie: the hard way), this can be used for any number of serious ailments- fusing broken bones, sealing injuries external and internal, etc. Supposedly has applications in healing brain damage and rousing the comatose, though bit sceptical at description provided. Again, v. v. unstable- wouldn't recommend using for papercuts and skinned knees."_

A deeply unpleasant train of thought rudely shoved Brollan's thoughts of grief out of his mind; slowly, he reached down and checked Moleburr's pulse again. When he was younger, he'd heard stories of people who'd fallen into comas so deep that they'd been thought dead by friends and relatives; what if Moleburr wasn't dead at all? What if he was just unconscious? What if his heartbeat and breathing was so shallow that even the Witch couldn't have noticed? _What if the healing spell could actually save Moleburr's life?_

Suddenly deaf to the urgent muttering of his own underdeveloped rationality, Brollan stared down at the words of the spell; could he cast it? Could he actually work the same magic that the Wicked Witch of the West had used in her reign of terror?

There was only one way to find out.

Focussing all his attention on Moleburr, he began reading; instantly, he felt the magic descending through the air towards the prone body at his feet; he felt his hair tingling as it passed, the energies crackling against his skin. Was this how the Witch felt when she cast a spell? No wonder she laughed the way she did! He'd have cackled like a madman if he had this power at his disposal. Then, Brollan remembered what he'd set out to do, and forced himself to think of the words he was supposed to be saying- he couldn't lose his place now.

The incantation was long and complicated, and he was pretty sure he stuttered and stumbled over some of the words, but it probably wouldn't matter so long as he finished it without hesitating. As the spell came to a close, he saw that the wounds on Moleburr's chest were beginning to close; but to his disappointment, Moleburr didn't stir.

Brollan reached out to check Moleburr's pulse at the neck for the second time in as many minutes…

…and found that he couldn't take his hand away. Somehow, he'd managed to fuse his own hand to Moleburr's throat.

For several seconds, he sat there, quietly asking himself what could have possibly caused this. Then, he saw that the flesh on Moleburr's body was slowly beginning to melt like candlewax, shifting and oozing under his hand. Realisation hit him squarely between the eyes: the spell was still in effect- and he'd screwed it up.

And then, before his horrified eyes, the flesh on Moleburr's neck began to move, surging upwards to _crawl _along his fingertips, across his arm and into his torso. Brollan's own skin writhed and bubbled as his friend's body was slowly assimilated by his own; his shoulders and ribcage erupted outwards, tearing his clothes to shreds in the process- before they too were slowly absorbed by the liquid mass of flesh that was now oozing over his limbs. Moleburr's body seemed to collapse, as more and more of his body poured itself into Brollan: skin, fat, muscle and bone- all were slowly incorporated into Brollan's growing body.

Screaming in pain and terror, Brollan clambered to his feet and began hobbling away in a vain attempt to escape the transformation. Quite naturally, he tripped over what was left of Moleburr's left leg, and fell…

… headlong into the pile of corpses.

Weighed down by the bodies he was absorbing, his nerves alight with pain, Brollan found himself wishing he could scream- if only he could figure out where his mouth had gone.

* * *

Half a mile under the plateau, Rasp looked around and absently wondered just how much longer he had left to live.

He had been crawling through the labyrinth of tunnels for the better part of an hour, and so far, he hadn't had much success in finding his way back into Oz. Not only was he effectively crippled and in danger of bleeding to death for most of the journey, he couldn't even tell which way he was going: at least when he'd been up in the sky, seated in a flying carpet, he'd had some idea of where he _could_ go and where his objective was (northeast); down here, in stygian darkness broken only by the occasional glow-worm on the wall, he didn't know if he was any closer to the Ozian border now than he was an hour ago.

But even if he could find his way back to Oz and a path leading out of the tunnels, crawl his way all the way back to the mansion and meet up with the other refugees, he was still going to die. Nobody among the refugees had the training or the supplies to help him- not that any physician worth a damn would be able to do much for Rasp. No, with his injuries, only magic could help him, and the odds of bumping into Elphaba down here were slim to none… and that was being optimistic.

Truth to be told, Rasp didn't really mind. He'd known he was going to die from the moment the hole in the ground had shut behind him, and he'd pretty much come to terms with it; he'd even managed to recover from his first major panic attack, pathetic and tearful though it was. What bothered him more than anything else at the moment was the very simple fact that he'd die_ here. _He didn't know why- after all, he'd probably spend the last few minutes of his life delusional from infections and low blood pressure, and he wouldn't even notice his surroundings; all the same, something about these lightless passageways beneath the earth gnawed at his composure, and the prospect of dying here _alone_ made the fear almost unbearable.

He reached out to the next handhold on the floor, and groaned as his broken ribs scraped painfully against the uneven granite. That was something he probably wouldn't get used to before he expired: the constant twinges of nerve-searing pain in his fractured bones as he crawled across the ground. Even though they were starting to fade a little- again, likely due to blood loss- Rasp still found it intolerable, if only because it usually felt like someone had just rammed a crowbar into his spine and was trying to pry his back open.

_Serves you right for trying to move in your condition, numbnuts,_ a friendly voice in the back of his head reminded him.

Rasp sighed deeply; maybe it'd be better if he stopped for a minute or two, just long enough to take a few deep breaths and somehow get his bearings. True, it wasn't likely that he'd actually discover anything meaningful, but it'd be nice to rest his kneecaps. So, after a few more agonising feet, he stopped, hauled himself over to the most comfortable patch of wall he could find, and slumped against it.

_I'll just stay here for a while,_ he thought vaguely. _I'll just rest my eyes for a minute or two- just long enough to get my breath back._

_Just for a minute,_ he assured himself, eyes fluttering. _Just for a m…_

* * *

Somewhere amidst the tracts of new forest that bordered the Emerald City, Dorothy Gale stood in horrified silence, mutely surveying the ruins of the once-great city.

In her arms, Billina the hen clucked urgently, trying to focus Dorothy's attention on the surrounding wilderness, but Dorothy barely noticed; the shock had deafened her to everything but the pounding of her own heartbeat.

Ever since she'd arrived back in Kansas, she'd dreamed of returning to Oz; at first, she'd only wanted the chance to see her friends again, but as repairs to the farmhouse slowed to a crawl and the rain turned the countryside to mud, she found herself longing for a glimpse of that vividly colourful landscape that had haunted her sleep. By the time the dreadful arguments between Aunt Em and Uncle Henry began, she wanted nothing more than to somehow make her way back into that magical country where nobody had ever seemed unhappy or downtrodden.

It got to the point where she couldn't even sleep for her constant wishing to find a way back to Oz, and Aunt Em had taken her to Doctor Worley for "electric healing," as the newspaper article had called it. But even as she'd sat in that tiny, sterile room and waited for the dreaded orderlies to take her away, she'd imagined that when the door finally opened, her pathway to Oz would be waiting on the other side. And in a way, she'd been right: after escaping the hospital and getting swept away by the river, she'd woken up in Oz, finally back in the world that had captivated her for so long.

But she'd never dreamed of finding it in ruins.

First, she'd found the scattered remnants of the Yellow Brick Road; heart racing, she'd followed it for the next two miles, barely stopping to grab Billina as she broke into a run. Along the way, she'd caught glimpses of ruined towns and crumbling houses, villages buried under the roots of forests that had never grown in this part of the country when Dorothy had last visited. Every step of the way, her fear grew; by the time the forest began to give way to hills and grassland, she was almost breathless with fear and worry. She tried to tell herself that the Emerald City might still be standing, that the Lion, the Tin Man and the Scarecrow wouldn't be in any danger, but it didn't work; it just made her imagine all the horrible things that might have happened to them, and made her stomach churn with anxiety.

Now she stood at the mouth of the forest, overlooking the remains of the Emerald City; truth be told, she would have had trouble recognizing it had it not been for the few distinctive buildings left standing, for the magnificent emeralds that had once made the city glitter so brilliantly on the horizon had gone, leaving only weather-beaten stone walls. Many of the familiar towers and spires of the skyline now lay in piles of shattered masonry, the beautiful architecture that had so enchanted Dorothy on her first visit now little more than rubble and broken statuary. Worst of all, from what little she could see from here, there were no signs of life visible from where she stood.

For all she knew, her friends were dead, there was nothing left of Oz except for these ruins, and she had returned to the land of her dreams only to be trapped there for the rest of her life.

A year ago, the thought of such a thing happening would have driven her to tears and left her sobbing helplessly into Toto's fur. But times had changed: quite apart from the fact that Toto had stayed behind in Kansas and Dorothy was now in the company of a cynical old hen with a marked aversion to being used as a handkerchief, she'd long since learned that crying wouldn't help anyone; the experiences of the last few months- from living in the unfinished farmhouse to being called mad by everyone who heard her speak of Oz- had taught her that much.

Instead, all Dorothy felt in that moment was a freezing numbness that smothered her fear and heartache, followed by the whirring of her mind as she began thinking as quickly and thoroughly as she could. Now was not the time to panic; she needed to find shelter, find food, and find someone who knew what had become of Oz.

Once she was safe and knew of what had happened, she could grieve for the friends she would never see again. Now, all she could do was plan and act accordingly.

Slowly, ignoring the frost that seemed to have covered her heart, Dorothy Gale stepped out of the trees and began the long march towards the tumbledown gates of the Emerald City.


	28. Unexpected Hope

A/N: Before this long-overdue chapter begins, I'd like to offer a massive grovelling apology for my lateness in delivering it. The last two months have been, to put it lightly, bollocks: it seemed like just about everything that could have stopped me from writing went about doing exactly that; work, homework, family events- at one point, my laptop broke down and forced me to start this chapter_ all over again._

And then, I got a sodding cold.

I _wish_ I was joking.

Once again, I can only apologise for the lateness and thank all of you for your patience (the fact that I still have subscribers is testament to that)- and hope that no anvils fall on me in the meantime. So, without further ado, the latest chapter: read, review, and above all, enjoy!

Update 7/6/12: Thanks for spotting the error, Wile E. Coyote. I should probably upload these chapters when I'm actually awake enough to spot typos and grammatical mistakes, but that'd likely require amphetamines.

Disclaimer: Wicked doth not belong to me, nor doth the Wizard of Oz, Return to Oz, or the works of L Frank Baum.

* * *

Deep in the wall of Glinda's palatial cell, the two spies whispered frantically to one another in tones inaudible to most modes of hearing, their voices abuzz with consternation.

Though they were numbered among the most accomplished of their kind, neither of them could be considered intuitive, or even especially intelligent: after all, their job was to observe, memorize and report events; actually thinking about what had been seen was a duty left for more important Nomes. All the same, neither of them could deny that their current target was behaving _very_ oddly.

Spymaster Vextras had warned them that the Protector known as "Basalt" was a potential security risk, and might even be considering an act of treason against His Majesty the King, so the spies had observed Basalt with all the diligence and caution such an individual would warrant. For most of their vigil, they'd been expecting an escape attempt of some kind; they'd watched his every move, waiting for him to try and outrun them, to plead with them to leave him alone, or even to attack them head-on. Instead, the Protector had gone about his duties without a single change in routine -until now; at the moment, he was no longer paying any attention to his sleeping charge, and was standing by the door of the cell, eyes shut, his head, torso and both arms rotating counter clockwise for no apparent reason; he also appeared to be speaking, but close examination revealed that he was not producing sound of any kind, his lips merely tracing the shapes of words too distorted for even the spies to read.

"Is he insane?" one of the spies inquired of the other.

"This is a possibility; however, it is also possible that he is "trying to lull us into a false sense of security." I have heard of such things occurring in the case of those who know that they are under observation. For all we know, it may simply be an element of his personality, aberrant though it may be; it is known that those of his class develop differently than us. It may not matter: if he does try to escape our sight, he will be intercepted by a dozen more of us, yes?"

"This is true. There _are_ more of us between him and most of his predicted directions, and numerous guards on patrol as well; if he does flee, he should not get far. However, the Protector does have his own spies, and they may be turned against us."

"In all likelihood, this is of little concern. Available intelligence suggests that his operatives are of lesser ranking. They cannot damage us, or even carry basic messages to any allies he may have accrued."

"Again, this is true, bu- what is he doing?"

Quite unexpectedly, Basalt's eccentric behaviour had come to an abrupt halt: the random swivelling of appendages had stopped, as had the inexplicable mouthing of words; his eyes were now open and he was staring directly at the spies. For perhaps five seconds, he stood perfectly still, his gaze fixed upon them- as if trying to outstare them. Then, just as one of the spies was beginning to wonder if this was another symptom of insanity, the Protector turned and fled through the wall behind him; pausing only to sound the alarm, the spies gave chase.

Less than three feet into the bedrock, both of them crashed headlong into a line of low-ranking spies that had been standing just outside the cell. As the two struggled to untangle themselves from the cluster of ethereal Nomes, they cast their senses out across the surrounded area, looking for any trace of Basalt. Unfortunately, it seemed that Basalt had taken full advantage of the accident, for he was nowhere in sight.

Worse still, across the expanse of rock that separated the rooms of the palace, they could see that other spies assigned to follow him were suffering identical collisions; almost as soon as one of the ancillary spies began their pursuit of Basalt, a row of low-ranking spies moved directly in front of them, resulting in catastrophic pile-ups. Even at a distance, it was clear that every single one of these low-ranking operatives was in Basalt's employ.

There was a thoughtful pause, as the two stranded spies considered the disaster.

"In all likelihood, this is of little concern?" echoed the first.

"It was a _feasible estimate_," said the second, defensively.

* * *

Basalt was careful to ensure that he took only the most circuitous route along the palace exterior; even if his agents had managed to delay all of the pursuers, he couldn't afford to have his trail followed too easily when the King's spies finally recovered, and recover they most assuredly would. Of course, this course of action was already a risky one; he had exactly one alibi on his side- that the spies had been positioned accidentally- and if that was not believed, then he and all the spies in his service would be either imprisoned or executed.

But he needed to do this; this was the only way he could possibly determine the correct course of action.

The solution he'd devised had occurred to him quite abruptly: he'd been lost in thought, trying to decide between the King, the Council or Elphaba- as he had been for the last forty minutes-, when he found himself looking back to first principles for an answer, all the way back to the orders he'd been implanted with when he was but a worker. There, among the first commandments that had been inscribed upon his newly-formed brain, was a single advisory notice to be read when he finally achieved his first promotion:

"If thy purpose or thy tasks seem unclear, then do not fear to ask advice from the wiser among you, for with intelligence cometh uncertainty."

And with that simple sentence, his inspiration had burned once again.

He'd begun planning almost immediately: he already knew who'd be able to advise him, but he still needed to determine how to get there and how to prevent the spies listening in on their conversation. To that end, he'd ordered what few agents he had on his side to locate every single one of the King's spies assigned to watch him, and find a way to block their approach once he started moving.

After that, he'd tried everything he could to lull his guardians into a false sense of security, if only so he'd have a head-start when it came time to make his escape. It wasn't easy: virtually everything he did only drew more attention from the watching eyes; eventually, he gave up on feigning insanity and ran for it. On the upside, this approach had worked, and he was now rushing through the depths of the mountain towards the advisor he sought.

If nothing else, Basalt was glad that the order hadn't specified that his advisor _had_ to be a Nome; after all, there was only one person in the entire palace with firsthand knowledge of what he was considering...

* * *

Somewhere beyond the comforting stream of memories, there was the sound of grinding rock, and someone politely coughing for attention.

Elphaba reluctantly tore her eyes away from the memory sphere, and saw that a Nome was standing before her. It took her a moment or two for her to realise that she'd met him before; it was Basalt, AKA The "Spy." She briefly wondered why a servant charged with protecting Glinda would want to speak with her now, and immediately regretted it: _maybe Glinda's been hurt,_ she thought, fear suddenly coursing through her veins. _Maybe she's sick; maybe she's woken up and tried to test the spell she was translating, and it backfired; maybe the King's torturing her to make me cooperate; maybe she's d-_

She hastily derailed that train of thought before it could gain any more speed; as worrying as this little visit appeared, she couldn't afford to lose her composure just yet. She took a deep breath and asked (somewhat irritably) "What is it?"

"I apologise for the intrusion, Miss Elphaba, but there is an issue requiring your immediate attention."

Stifling a few thousand visions of Glinda dead or dying, Elphaba all but _leaped_ off the bed. "Is it Glinda?" she demanded. "Is she hurt? Has something gone wrong with her research? Did the sleep spell backfire?"

"Not at all: Miss Glinda is currently in perfect health, and at present, she is in no danger from any source, physical or mental. My visit concerns issues somewhat more important."

The fear instantly dissipated; smothering the urge to sigh in relief, Elphaba rolled her eyes and grumbled, "In other words, the Nome King ordered you to see if I'm any closer to giving up. As you can see, I'm not; now go away."

"The King did not send me, Miss Elphaba. I am here of my own choosing."

"Is that so? Alright then: what do you want?"

There was another palpable moment of hesitation, and Elphaba had the distinct impression that, once again, Basalt was trying to find the right words to say. For eight long seconds, the silence dragged on; finally, the Nome servant spoke, and not in his usual flat monotone, but in a soft whisper that sounded almost pleading to Elphaba's ears:

"I need your help."

"What?"

"As I have said before, I know you have little reason to help or even trust me, but I beg you to at least consider it, for I am faced with a conundrum that only you can solve."

"So, what else is new?" she remarked dryly. "I take it this has nothing to do with the Grimmerie."

"This is true."

"Then why am I the only one who can help? In case you haven't noticed, you've got a King armed with a few thousand years worth of experience and a spy network that went unnoticed by Oz for two decades; I think he'd be more than capable of answering any questions you might have."

"I cannot ask this of him, for he has no knowledge of the problem, though he would no doubt claim otherwise. I am here because you have firsthand experience with the issue at hand, and I believe you are the only living being in the palace capable of providing an answer."

Elphaba wearily pinched the bridge of her nose, and wondered if all Nomes were this inquisitive. "Go ahead, then," she said. "Ask your question; it's not as if I have anything better to do."

Basalt nodded, took a breath he probably didn't need, and asked "Would you choose rebellion again?"

_And with that, you have my undivided attention..._

"What brought _this_ on?" she asked suspiciously.

"Glinda has told me everything she knew of you: in spite of everything that the Wizard offered you, from power to the acceptance of his citizens, you rebelled against him; though you were alone in your rebellion and hated by the people of Oz, you persevered; though it cost you so much, you never truly gave in and accepted the Wizard's bargain any longer than a moment. But Glinda also told me of how the rebellion ended, of how you were betrayed and-"

"Broken," Elphaba finished. "And I wasn't betrayed," she added. "No matter how much Glinda might blame herself for Nessa's death and Fiyero's torture, she didn't know what Morrible was going to do."

"This is true, though in all likelihood, Glinda would only accept this truth if it was from your lips."

"If we could get back to your point, Basalt, why couldn't you have asked the King this? He's planning of a rebellion of his own, remember?"

"It is not the same, Miss Elphaba: in rebelling against the War Council, the King has nothing to lose and literally everything to gain. By rebelling, you cast aside everything that was offered you and chose a life of hardship and conflict- not for personal gain, but for the Animals which you defended. Glinda was very clear on that point. So, I ask you, if you had the chance to accept the Wizard's offer again, would you take it, or would you rebel again?"

_And somehow, you know something that the King told only me. For someone who isn't actually one of the King's spies, you certainly end up seeing a lot more than you let on, don't you? _

In spite of herself, Elphaba smiled. "I've held on to as many of these memories as I could," she said, nodding at the sphere lying on the bed beside her. "And I've learned as much as I could from them. The only reason I'd even consider accepting the bargain would be so I'd have the time and resources to tear the Wizard's regime apart from the inside out. Either way, I'd rebel. I'd _always_ rebel."

"And if someone were to ally themself with you, would you counsel them to do otherwise, knowing that they would lose as much as you?"

"Well, no-one allied themselves with me, so it's a moot point."

"But what if someone _had?_ Someone in the Wizard's service, someone disillusioned and uncertain, someone who would lose everything by supporting you; would you tell him to return to his duties and live out his life as he had once thought he should, or would you encourage him to rebel?"

Now it was Elphaba's turn to hesitate. "We're not really talking about the past, are we?" she said thoughtfully.

"Miss Elphaba, _please,_ I need an answer; you know that the King's plans cannot be tolerated if the people of Oz are to survive- it is the same for my fellow Nomes."

"How's that, exactly?"

Basalt paused for half a minute, brow knotting with concentration. "Imagine," he suggested haltingly, "That one morning, every single citizen of Oz were to wake up and discover that their minds now existed _outside_ their bodies: they would have to learn how to survive an existence that none of them were equipped to cope with and none of them had ever asked for; there could be unrest, insanity, countless deaths. There is no way of predicting what will happen to my people- or indeed the rest of the world- once the plan is complete. The King may mean well, but-"

"-But good intentions don't make good people," finished Elphaba. "Where have I heard this sad tale before?" She shook her head wearily, and stood, stretching her arms and legs as the Nome servant waited patiently for an answer. "Well," she said at last, "I'm glad that you're considering a rebellion, but why do you need me to decide for you?"

"Because I cannot do so myself!" said Basalt, and Elphaba recognized something akin to desperation in the Nome's voice. "The King is undoubtedly a threat to Nome society and the world at large, but so is the Council- and they are my most likely source of assistance; the only way to stop them would be to side with the King, leading back to my current dilemma. If I side with the King to stop the Council, I betray my people; if I side with the Council to stop the King, I betray the King, betray my people and betray Glinda; if I rebel, I betray everything that I swore to serve in what may be a hopeless rebellion that could cost the life of Glinda, yourself and everyone else involved. I cannot bring myself to choose when so many lives may be lost if I choose wrongly; my own bonds and oaths of servitude are in conflict, and my own opinion is worth nothing because I have no experience with this matter, so I must ask someone wiser for their counsel. Please, Miss Elphaba: you know of rebellion; you know more than I can ever hope to know... and you are the only one in the palace who can help me. Please, give me orders; tell me what to do."

For a moment, Elphaba was silent. She wondered, very briefly, if Basalt was readying some kind of trap for her, but it didn't seem likely. After all, she was already in prison; how could answering a simple question hurt her prospects of escaping when there weren't any to begin with?

"I can't order you to do anything, Basalt," she said at last. "And you certainly can't just allow someone to decide whether or not you should rebel: either you do it or you don't. When I chose to rebel against the Wizard, I had to make the decision alone; it's been the same for just about every single rebel in recorded history, and so it's the same for you: only _you_ can decide what happens now. But if it makes you feel any better, you have my blessing- from one rebel to another. Your rebellion isn't hopeless."

"How so? You have seen the King's power in action; you know that he has an army under his command. The Generals of the War Council are the same; altogether, their magical power almost equals that of the King, and each general has an army of his own-"

"The Wizard had armies of his own too, and for all the years I fought him, none of them ever managed to arrest me- and I openly opposed him. _You're_ still free to move around the palace; you're not suspected of anything, right? I'd say you're off to a pretty decent start."

For the second time in as many minutes, something not unlike emotion could be seen on Basalt's face. "Thank you," he said softly.

And then, somewhere just above their heads, there was an ominous rumble. Though she'd only known about the enemy for less than a week and been in contact with them for even less than that, Elphaba had managed to identify it as the sound of a group of Nomes moving through the earth nearby; judging by the volume, it was probably a very large group, too. Basalt glanced up at the ceiling for a moment, his eyes darting from one end of the roof to the other, as if he was trying to guess at where the Nomes were going. Then, pausing only to bow respectfully to Elphaba, he hurried towards the eastern wall and disappeared into the stone before she could say another word. A minute later, the rumbling faded as the horde of Nomes changed direction, now following Basalt eastwards.

_So much for being free to move around the palace! No wonder you were so shaky about rebelling, you poor bastard._

Stifling the urge to sigh in despair, Elphaba sat down on the bed, and reached for the memory sphere- only to find that it was no longer nestled among the blankets as it had been; a swift check under the bed revealed that it hadn't fallen while she'd been talking to Basalt, and she hadn't absentmindedly picked it up in the meantime, either. There was no sign of the sphere anywhere else in the room, either.

Then the answer hit her: the Nomes following Basalt had only started following him about half a minute after he'd left- meaning that, in all likelihood, Basalt had doubled back and stolen the sphere.

And for the first time in what felt like hours, Elphaba found herself laughing.

* * *

Dorothy leaned against the wall, her breath emerging in short, ragged gasps, and her heart thundering almost out of control. For a time, she stood there, listening to the enraged snarls of the Wheelers that had gathered outside and hoping that the door was heavy enough to keep them out. Thankfully, none of them had hands to pick the lock, so she at least had time to catch her breath.

One thing was certain at the moment, though: if she hadn't had the key to this room with her, she'd be dead now. She didn't know _how_ the thing had ended up in Kansas in the first place, but she silently thanked Bilina for finding it.

"You'll have to come out of there sooner or later!" howled one of the Wheelers; as far as Dorothy could tell, this was their leader. "And when we do, we're going to tear you to pieces..."

As the death threats continued, Dorothy briefly wondered how the Wheelers could tear her to pieces if none of them had hands; then she remembered the bloodstains on the Lead Wheeler's front tyres. "I haven't done anything to you!" she said, desperately.

"Oh? Isn't that a _stolen _lunchpail in your hand? Isn't that a chicken in there with you?"

Bilina, who was now sitting on top of an old wooden box by the door, clucked nervously.

Dorothy, meanwhile, could only sigh in exasperation: this new Oz that she'd arrived in made no sense to her; yes, she had taken a piece of fruit from a lunchpail tree, but as far as she'd been able to see at the time, there were no signs that anybody had actually owned the orchard. And what did chickens have to do with anything?

As if by way of explanation, the Lead Wheeler howled, "The Nome King doesn't allow chickens anywhere in Oz!"

"Who's the Nome King?" she asked.

In that moment, Dorothy swore she could hear Wheelers snorting with barely-concealed laughter. Then, the leader echoed, "Who's the Nome King?"

The crowd behind him shrieked with raucous laughter; in between bursts of hysterical giggling, Dorothy heard the squeaking wheels of the Wheelers slowly retreating back down the corridor, their laughter fading with every step. Eventually, even the mocking chorus of "Who's the Nome King?" faded away.

But Dorothy knew they hadn't gone far: they were probably readying an ambush for her at the mouth of the passageway, just waiting for the moment when hunger or thirst would force her outside. Until then, this room was the only safe place in the entire city- whatever this room was, anyway. As far as she could tell, it looked like a storeroom: shelves, boxes, junk... and then, as her eyes swept across the rubbish behind her, she saw the thing lying in the corner.

At first, it seemed little more than another pile of junk littering the room: but then, as she peer closer, she recognized something that looked vaguely like a helmeted face, and a pair of skinny arms protruding from what looked like an ancient suit of armour. Looking twice at those fleshless arms, Dorothy found herself wondering (with a thrill of morbid fascination) if there was actually a dead body under the tarnished old armour, that these were the remains of an Ozian soldier who had somehow managed to escape the disaster outside- only to die of his injuries here.

However, as her eyes adjusted to her eyes, she realised that the thing wasn't lying on the floor at all, but standing on two stumpy legs; its arms were, just like the rest of it, made of copper. In fact, the thing didn't look particularly lifelike at all: if anything, it looked like an oversized toy, what with its round body, spindly arms and extravagantly moustached face; even its glass eyes looked somewhat doll-like. Taking a few hesitant steps forwards, Dorothy noticed something bolted to the thing's chest: brushing away the dust and cobwebs that had layered it, she found that it was actually a badge marked with Oz's distinctive Z-inside-the-O emblem. Below it were embossed four words, which Dorothy read aloud for Bilina's benefit:

"The Royal Army of Oz."

"_Army?"_ Bilina squawked incredulously. "That's just a bunch of old junk!"

Dorothy glanced back down at the tarnished heap of copper; she wasn't entirely ready to dismiss it just yet- after all, Bilina's newfound ability to speak came with its own special brand of cynicism. More to the point, Dorothy had first mistaken the Tin Man for a heap of junk by the side of the road as well when she'd first met him...

_And now, he's a statue, just like everyone else here._

Dorothy hastily banished that thought: she couldn't afford to think like that now; she needed to stay focussed if she was going to survive and find out what had happened to the Scarecrow.

Peering around the "Army's" ponderous bulk, she found three clockwork handles; next to them, a plaque had been set in the copper, which Dorothy once again read aloud for Bilina: "Patented Clockwork Mechanical Man: Does Everything But Live!"

Dorothy hesitated: she didn't know why, but there was something familiar about that overblown description – as though she'd known the writer, or the salesman, or the creator, or whoever had set the plaque in the first place. "For thinking," she continued, "Wind number 1 under left arm; for speaking, wind number 2, under right arm; for walking and action, wind number 3 in middle of back. Guaranteed to work perfectly for a thousand years."

Bilina scoffed. "You don't actually _believe_ that, do you?" she said.

"I don't know. I'll wind him up, and we'll see."

Reaching down for handle #1, she brushed away the cobwebs that had gathered around it, and gave it three brisk turns: thankfully, though the "Army" was clearly tarnished, it wasn't rusted, for the air was immediately filled with the sound of clockwork gently whirring to life. True to the instructions, though, the Army didn't move.

There was an awkward silence.

"I wonder what it's thinkin' _about,"_ Bilina remarked, snidely.

Dorothy rolled her eyes, and reached for the next handle. "I'll wind up his speech, and maybe he can tell us..."

From somewhere deep within the Army, there came the sound of another set of gears grinding into motion; then, as Dorothy crept back to the front of the creature, the Army's eyelids finally creaked open. Though the eyes beneath were just glass marbles set in the corroded face, Dorothy had the distinct impression that the creature had seen her. Then, it spoke- at first only gibberish, and then random words with no apparent connection, but as the thing's tarnished clockwork went on whirring, a sentence finally emerged:

"Good-Morning, Little-Girl."

On reflex, Dorothy curtsied and said, "Good morning, sir."

In the silence that followed, Dorothy once again had the inexplicable feeling that the Army was examining her face. Then, it hesitantly asked, "Are-You-Dorothy-Gale?"

"Yes, sir."

"Pleased-To-Meet-You. I-Am-Tik-Tok, The-Royal-Army-Of-Oz. His-Majesty, The-Scarecrow, Locked-Me-In-Here-And-Told-Me-To-Wait-For-You..."

* * *

Far below the palace, the Nome spies finally emerged from the depths of the bedrock into a massive cavern; Basalt had led them from one end of the capital to the next, and it was only after an hour of following his trail that they had caught up with him here, in a disused region of the underground passage. Records suggested that the Protector had been here before, accompanying Glinda when she'd been allowed time to rest and recuperate; Basalt's actions made little sense to any of the spies that were pouring into the cavern: after all, why would he return to a place already on record, where he could be so easily found?

Perhaps his reasons would become clear once he was apprehended and questioned- perhaps not; for the moment, it mattered little, for Basalt was now in full view of the approaching spies. He stood motionless at the very centre of the chamber, his back to them, arms folded, head bowed. He gave no sign that he had even noticed anyone entering the area, or that he cared. As they drew closer, some of the spies wondered if the Protector was actually planning to attack them; it would not matter if he did, for the chase across the Palace grounds had drawn in not only the full complement of operatives assigned to watch Basalt, but four Palace Guards- all of them more than a match for a lone Protector with little to no fighting experience.

The twenty-five gathered operatives quickly went about surrounding him, forming a tight circle around Basalt, with the guards moving close enough prevent him from leaving through the floor. This time, he wouldn't have the chance to retreat through the earth- although admittedly, he didn't appear to have considered this particular course of action.

"What are you doing here?" asked one of the guards.

Basalt said nothing.

"By leaving your post, you are in violation of the King's orders. Why have you chosen to disobey?"

"It would take too long to explain," said Basalt.

"Incorrect; we have as much time as necessary to question you. So, why are you here? What have you planned?"

"I did not plan this, exactly; I was improvising for most of the chase until I remembered something important I left here when I last visited."

"And what was that?"

Basalt hesitated; for a moment, his gaze flickered towards the ground, as if he was considering a retreat. "I must apologise for what is about to happen," he said quietly.

"Answer the question," snapped the guard. "What did you leave here?"

Very slowly, the Protector's head rose; something had torn a hole in his face, ruining his left eye and destroying half his mouth. His arms slowly unfolded, revealing that his right hand was missing, too; to the closest of the spies, it looked as though something had _chewed_ it off.

In that moment, all other questions in the minds of the watching spies were extinguished. What Basalt's original intentions had been, whether he was a traitor or not, why he hadn't yet taken the time to heal himself or at the very least take a new body- all of them disappeared, leaving behind only the most obvious question of all: what could have done such a thing?

"I spent some time finding them," said Basalt. "Most of them were reluctant to emerge after their last failed attempt to attack intruders in their territory; Glinda made quite an impression. They were even more reluctant to move with such a large group following me, but I baited them as best as I could." He held up the mangled stump of his arm by way of explanation. "Once they'd smelt Nome magic in the air, they were frenzied enough to set out in force. By the time you found me here..."

He paused. "Again, I must apologise."

"What have you done?" hissed the guard.

As if answering him, something vaguely humanoid dropped from the ceiling and landed atop the guard's shoulders; as he fell forward, the thing lurched horribly into the light, and the crowd of spies and warriors recoiled in alarm as they recognized the twisted figure of a Stygian Hunger. Meanwhile, the guard struggled to rise, only for two frondlike arms to wrap themselves around his throat, a dozen tiny mouths oozed from the monster's liquid skin to chew upon his body- even as its main jaws, framed with clusters of grasping hands, opened wide to swallow the guard's skull. One of the others guards lunged to force the Stygian Hunger off the flailing Nome's back, only to be brought crashing to the ground by two more; the spies, not equipped to fight the things that lurked in the chasms beneath the Nome Dominions, began shuffling quickly away from the ensuing melee, only to be brought to a halt by an entire gang of Hungers.

The crowd scattered, some disappearing into the floor, others hurrying towards the opposite walls, but very few came close- either shattered from beneath as they tried to descend, or swarmed and messily devoured by the growing horde, for by now, Stygian Hungers were clawing their way into the chamber from virtually every imaginable direction. Some of them even went so far as to burrow after the few Nomes that managed to escape: after months without proper sustenance, they weren't about to give up the banquet that had arrived in their territory.

In the chaos that followed, it took quite some time for the survivors to shake off their pursuers and limp back towards the palace and report the massacre that had just occurred, and by then, Basalt had vanished without a trace.

* * *

One of the major disadvantages of no longer having to put up with the memory sphere, Elphaba realized, was that without it, there honestly wasn't much else to do.

She'd already paced the room for thirty-seven times, checked the walls for structural weaknesses fifteen times, checked the bathroom for weak points around the sink and the toilet three times, and sat on the bed and tried to calm down in almost every single major interval between these inanities. She'd tried to get some sleep once or twice, but she was so frazzled with nerves that she'd had to get up after ten minutes and start pacing the room again. Nesides, the longer she lay there, the more she thought about the surviving refugees: Gnoll and the others cowering in the old mansion, crushed by failure; Brollan, still dragging the corpse of his friend across the wastes; and Javelin, too exhausted to run, surrounded on all sides by Nome soldiers.

Apart from her routines, there was nothing to occupy her attention anywhere in the room, no decorations in sight, no bookshelves on the walls - and no sign of her bag, either. This was almost certainly deliberate: the King probably intended that she didn't have anything to do apart from watch her own alternate memories until she gave into temptation. And now that she was free of the damn thing, Elphaba didn't feel like giving into temptation anymore.

In fact, she currently felt like applying a sledgehammer to the Nome King's front teeth.

Until then, of course, she could only wait and try to loosen the shackles around her magic; common sense dictated that she should just wait until Basalt got around to helping her, but common sense was a flimsy thing that tended to fall to pieces when you realised that the people who espoused it didn't have an ounce of it in the bodies. Meanwhile, quite apart from the fact that she had literally nothing else to do, trying to make her powers usable again was the only other escape option if Basalt's assistance never arrived.

_Or if it _does _arrive, and I'm forced to act alone anyway,_ Elphaba thought grimly.

* * *

After a long and perilous flight through the stone and the lightless tunnels threaded about it, Basalt found himself just outside the palace walls, planning his next move.

With the spies no longer watching him, he was free to go about the business of helping Elphaba. Unfortunately, the logical problem with this mission was immediately obvious; he honestly wasn't much help on his own. He had no magical power or knowledge of his own; his physical strength was not especially impressive by Nome standards; he didn't know anyone who might be sympathetic and trustworthy enough to help; and finally, his usefulness as an ally in battle was limited by the fact that he was still a servant of the King: all Roquat had to do was give him a direct order to stop, and the rebellion would be over before it even began.

So, pausing only to form a new body, he hurried inside the palace and made his way as stealthily as possible towards the library- specifically towards the shelves that housed the ancient codes of conduct for each station of Nome, from the lowly workers to the highest of the nobility. It was extraordinarily unlikely that he'd find anything useful among these books, but perhaps there might be some long-forgotten clause that would benefit him somehow. Maybe he had the right to command troops in battle, or wield magical artefacts in emergencies; it was "a long shot" (as he'd heard Glinda put it) but this was the only option he had so far.

He spent the next few minutes crouched behind a bookshelf, reading the Protector's Code of Conduct and hoping that the librarian hadn't noticed him enter. He read as quickly as he could without damaging the book or missing any important details, but always spurred on by the thought of what would happen if wasted too much time- the spies reporting his betrayal, the guards searching the palace, finding him, arresting him, executing him...

By large, the book contained nothing that Basalt didn't already know: most of it had already been imprinted on his brain when he'd been promoted, and the remainder didn't seem particularly important. According to the manual, Protectors were supposed to act alone, defending mortal or similarly-vulnerable charges from harm inflicted by equally-mortal assailants, for the book had been written in a much more idealistic time when political intrigue among Nomes was largely unthought-of. They weren't allowed to direct soldiers or avail themselves to anything more dangerous than a standard-issue hand weapon; in fact, as far as social amenities went, they were only permitted to command spies, a clause that Basalt already knew about.

He was about to shut the book, when a line at the bottom of the page caught his eye:

_In times of the direst emergency, when the guards are not present, and the charge is beset on all sides with no chance of escape or defence through normal means, the Protector can utilize the workers for construction to this end._

For a moment, the words seemed to _glow_ before his eyes; then, Basalt's mind began to race once more...

* * *

Half an inch.

Maybe less than that - maybe just a quarter of an inch off the bed – but whatever the case, the hat was no longer sitting on the bed. Any higher than that, and the magic dwindled away as the bindings around her powers tightened once more.

Elphaba's attempts at loosening the shackles had been experimental at best: for the most part, she'd only managed to get it to work once every few minutes or so; at any other time, even the most basic magical techniques failed to work. Given that most of the wards and seals around this place seemed to be actively maintained by the King himself, these brief periods of freedom probably occurred when the King's attention was drawn elsewhere.

_All very well and good,_ she thought, _but how can I take advantage of that?_

Sighing in exasperation, she returned her attention to her hat; once again, her thaumaturgical grip on the damn thing had faltered, and it had fallen back to the bed. Either the King's attention had returned to his guests, or Elphaba had simply reached the limit of her current capabilities... and trying to determine which of the two was the case would probably form the basis of her next few hours of work.

For a moment, she sat there, massaging her temples and trying not to scream obscenities at the ceiling; then, she leaned forward, focussed her attention on the hat...

And then, with a low-pitched grinding of rock against rock, the back wall of her cell crumbled, shifted, and finally melted away.

Elphaba blinked. Five crowded seconds passed as she replayed the incident in her mind, watching the wall slowly collapse in on itself, drawing back into the unmistakable shape of a tunnel leading off into the darkness. And from where she sat, she could clearly see that there were no guards waiting to escort her to the audience chamber or the office, for this wasn't the usual door that the King's lackey's had used to usher her in and out of the chamber; this was a new passageway altogether, dug into a wall that had been solid bedrock up until now.

Slowly, she eased herself out of bed and tiptoed towards the gaping hole that had replaced the furthermost wall of the room; peering into the dimly-lit passage, she saw a long flight of stairs slowly leading downwards. Given just how smoothly and swiftly the tunnel had been dug, this thing was almost certainly of Nome construction; either Basalt had finally made his move, or someone in the upper echelons was screwing around with her.

Not for the first time that day, Elphaba briefly toyed with the idea that this might be some vast, intricate trap of the King's, but then logic caught up with her. So, pausing only to retrieve her hat, she took a deep breath, and began the slow descent into the tunnel.

It took a long time to reach the bottom of the staircase; without the watch she'd left in her backpack, time was still difficult to judge. In any event, once she'd found herself moving horizontally again, the tunnel took so many twists and turns that she had to wonder just how far away it was taking her from the palace- or how deep _into_ it, as the case might be. After what felt like fifteen whole minutes of walking, the tunnel finally came to a stop at what had once been a stone wall; evidently, the construction was still in process, for the wall was slowly beginning to dissolve into an open archway into the room beyond.

As for the room itself, Elphaba didn't need to see the hunched figure behind the desk to realise that she'd been guided back down into Oscar Diggs' prison once again.

A surprised pause followed, as Diggs looked up from the nest of papers that cluttered his desk. "Elphaba?" he whispered. "How did _you_ get down here?"

"It's a very long story," she said wearily. "Truth to be told, I don't even know how the tunnel could have even reached this cell in the first place; I mean, this room's supposed to be locked away in a dimension of its own, right?"

"That's usually the case, and normally the King's very prompt about sending the cell back into the ether." The Ex-Wizard shrugged, his mangled shoulders twitching spasmodically as he did so. "Maybe he forgot?" he suggested.

"Why would he do that after planning this scheme out so carefully? Why make such an amateur mistake now, of all times?"

"Don't ask me. I mean, he did seem pretty eager to talk to you; maybe he just got carried away. Maybe he didn't think I was all that important anymore. But that's irrelevant right now; the question is how did you find your way down here, and why?"

"I was led down here," said Elphaba, flatly. "Unless I've misread all the signals, I've got an ally in the palace, and he's guided me down here because you might just have something that can stop the Nome King's plans."

Diggs' grave expression held for exactly three seconds; then, he burst out laughing, his hoarse guffaws echoing across the room and down the passageway. Eventually, the laughter dissolved into a brief coughing fit, which took some time to subside before Diggs was able to speak again; "We _really_ are in dire straits if you're turning to me for help," he wheezed. "Right now, I've got one spell memorized, and that's it."

"There must be _something_ here that could help us. I mean, why else would I have been led down here in the first place?" Elphaba's mind immediately conjured up the word "trap." Ignoring the paranoia, she tried to think of another option- and realised she was looking directly at it; bustling across the room towards the desk, she began leafing through the pile of designs and blueprints, kicking up enormous clouds of dust in the process. "You've had a whole year alone to think of all these," she continued. "Is there _anything_ here that might work against Nomes?"

"Oh, all sorts of things," said Diggs vaguely. "Weapons, vehicles, buildings, you name it." Reaching into the pile, he held up a faded drawing of a massive, cathedral-shaped automaton mounted on a set of gargantuan wheels, each wall studded with gunports and bristling with armaments. "This one was my first idea- much too fantastical as far as designs go, actually. It'd collapse under its own weight before the first gun was fired, and the Nomes would tear the rest to pieces. I presume you're looking for something more practical?"

Elphaba rolled her eyes. "That _would_ help," she grumbled.

"Alright, alright... This one was from when I actually started putting serious thought into escaping..."

The vehicle that Diggs had sketched on the next paper was clearly designed to be much smaller than the first- about fifteen feet to twenty feet long at the most. Instantly distinguished by the drill-head at its prow and the diminutive smokestack protruding from the engine, this thing was clearly built for boring through solid rock; judging by the two massive pincers that deployed from behind the drill and the cannons built into its flanks, it was also well-equipped for attack and defence. The wheels looked particularly strange to Elphaba's eyes; as far as she could tell, all of them were coated with a thick, chain-like coating of leather and cloth, grouping them into two gigantic oblong-shaped wheels.

"If you were to build this," she said, "How long do you think it would take?"

"It'd depend on the size of the team or the resources I had at my disposal; maybe how much time or space we had to work with, as well. And in case you haven't noticed," he said wearily, "We don't have any of those, Elphaba."

"We've got plenty of space," Elphaba pointed out.

"And that's _all_ we have apart from a design: we've got no materials to work with, no machinery to turn the materials into components, no tools to put the components together, and worst of all, we don't have anyone to help us assemble this monstrosity."

There was a polite cough from somewhere behind him.

Diggs, crushed by an entire year of torture, didn't even bother to look crestfallen; he just stood there, head bowed low as if he was expecting to be struck. Elphaba, on the other hand, found herself scanning the walls around them, trying to determine the source of the noise.

Looking back at her from the walls were Nomes- dozens upon dozens of them crammed into every available patch of stone in the room. Unlike most of the Nomes she'd met up until now, these ones were quite short from what she could see of them; most of them barely reached waist-height. Standing just apart from them was Basalt; towering over every other Nome in the room, he was clearly leading the mob, if the honour guard of figures shuffling after him was any evidence.

There was a long and terrifying silence.

And then Basalt said, "Can we be of assistance?"

* * *

A/N: I hope you enjoyed the episode, ladies and gents, and hope that I haven't turned Basalt into a Mary-Sue- as always, it's a tightrope. Stay tuned for the next chapter!


	29. Challenges

A/N: Ladies and Gentleman, I humbly present this latest chapter. Unfortunately, this one has been a pain in the arse to write; quite frankly, this part of the story has been the literary equivalent of level grinding- it's necessary to continue the story, but it's still a chore; no small irony considering the chapter title. I also must apologise, because I think I dragged this chapter out far too long for its own good in just getting all the characters where they need to be. As such, the next chapter's going to be A) short, and B) to the point. I hope you enjoy what I've done with this latest one, however.

So, without further ado- read, review and enjoy!

Disclaimer: Wicked does not belong to me; if it did, the characters would have mutineed.

* * *

As far as Dorothy could tell, this tower had once been part of the Wizard's palace; though it was hard to be sure with the emeralds missing from the walls and the rest of the building in ruins, she could still recognize the turrets overhead. As for whether or not there was anyone left alive behind those iron gates...

"Tik-Tok?" she whispered. "Have you ever heard of this "Princess Mombi" before?"

"Never-before-today."

"Do you think he could have been lying? I mean, he could have said anything if he'd thought you'd let go of him."

"This-is-possible," Tik-Tok admitted. "But-for-the-most-part, Wheelers-rarely-lie-once-captured-and-interrogated; the-fungi-they-eat-lowers-their-resistance-to-questioning, makes-them-overly-talkative. I-doubt-that-he-would-have-been-too-different-from-the-others."

Dorothy peered through the gates, wondering if there was another ambush waiting for them in the shadowy corridors behind it. Then again, she reflected, it wasn't as if they had any other options on hand: this Mombi, assuming that the Wheeler hadn't been lying, was the only one who knew where the Scarecrow had been taken_._ So, taking a deep breath, she reached out and gave one of the gates an experimental push. To her surprise, it wasn't locked or barred, and swung open fairly easily, revealing a hall cluttered with rubbish; past the ranks of empty boxes, wilted potted plants, broken statues, rusted machines, and piles of moth-eaten clothes, Dorothy could see the first steps of a long flight of stairs.

Steeling herself, she stepped inside, trying to ignore the smell of dampness and rot in the air and focus on less unpleasant things: the sound of Tik-Tok's clanking footsteps behind her, or Bilina clucking her disapproval at the mess around them. Thankfully, the smells were the only threat the hall offered, for they reached the stairs in a matter of seconds, and began the slow climb towards the top of the tower.

As they ascended and the rubbish began to dwindle, Dorothy recognized that this place had definitely once been part of the Wizard's palace: the green marble floors, the walls emblazoned with the Z-inside-the-O insignia, the chandeliers- all of it she recognized. However, most of them had been left untidied for years on end, it seemed, for the floor and the furniture were layered with a thick carpet of dust, and the doorframes were curtained with cobwebs. Oddly enough, there were no sign of any spiders anywhere nearby- at least, not any _living ones_: every so often, they would find a few dead, often alongside the tiny, withered bodies of mice.

"What do you think killed them?" Dorothy asked, her skin crawling.

Bilina pecked at one of the corpses, examining it for a minute. "Old age," she said at last. "They all died of old age."

"_All_ of them?"

"Do you think I'd mistake it for anything else, my dear? I've seen a lot of dead mice in the farmhouse in my time, and these ones weren't killed by poison, traps, or cats for that matter: they died of old age, plain and simple."

"But-All-Of-Them-At-Once?" Tik-Tok queried. "I-Doubt-This-Occurred-Naturally. Perhaps-Mombi-Did-This-Via-Magic."

Dorothy shuddered, and tried not to think of what it would feel like to be on the receiving end of such a spell- or worse still, how Mombi would react to finding that someone had broken in.

Continuing up the next two flights of stairs, (Tik-Tok leaving dinner-plate sized footprints in the dust) they found that most of the doors had been locked and barred, and those that weren't had been crammed with more rubbish- and in one case, the skeletal corpse of a long-dead Wheeler, much to Dorothy's horror. Curiously enough, much like the group of statues out in the garden, the body was missing its head.

Not long after this nasty shock, they became aware of music playing in the distance; with so little to muffle the noise as it echoed down through the corridors, Dorothy couldn't help but marvel at just how unearthly it sounded. It was impossible to tell what instrument the music was being played on from here, but it was just audible enough to follow up the stairs and through the corridors. After many twists and turns, the three of them finally found themselves facing a gold door; it was little more than a screen of curling gold vines and fronds surrounding a solid gold M-shape, but unlike the rest of the tower, this door had been carefully dusted and polished until it gleamed in the dim light.

As they approached, the door split into three halves, each of them disappearing silently into the doorframe, allowing them into what had to be the largest room left in the building. Much like the door, a lot of gold had gone into this room's construction: gold columns, gold wall fixtures, golden candelabras, gold chairs with red cushions, golden chandeliers... And alongside them, there were the mirrors: they were the walls between the columns, the ceiling that they supported, the floor- everywhere Dorothy looked, her reflection looked back. Once again, every single surface had been painstakingly swept and buffed until the gold appeared to glow from within.

With so many things to draw her eyes away from the centre of the room, Dorothy almost completely failed to notice that there was anyone else in the room, until she happened to glance straight ahead and see the figure sitting at the end of the room. Trembling, Dorothy crept closer, trying to keep her mind on the reassuring thud of Tik-Tok's footsteps.

The woman was clearly the source of the music, for as the three of them approached, they saw that she was languidly strumming what looked like a small guitar ("A-mandolin," Tik-Tok quietly informed Dorothy). She was almost lost in the folds of an enormous brocaded velvet mantle that covered not only her body, but also most of the couch she was sitting on; around the woman's shoulders, the mantle bore a crest of several long metal quills, so long they looked like peacock's feathers at a distance. As for the woman herself, all that could be seen of her beyond the dress was her face; it was a pretty face, all things considered, with smooth, delicate features, light brown hair, and an expression that looked almost sleepy. In fact, the only thing about her that truly unnerved Dorothy was the fact that she hadn't appeared to have noticed them in spite of all the noise their footsteps made in the echoing room.

Three feet away from her, the woman finally stopped playing; in the echoing silence that followed Dorothy asked, "Excuse me, miss, but are you Princess Mombi?"

The woman nodded vaguely, somehow managing to do so without actually looking in their direction; then, before Dorothy could ask another question, she yawned theatrically, and, putting aside the mandolin, extended a hand. "Help me to rise," she said softly.

Taken aback- and not willing to anger the woman so readily- Dorothy found herself setting Bilina on the floor and reaching out to help Mombi to her feet. Once she was upright, Mombi peered down at Dorothy's face, gently turning it to the left and the right with one manicured finger, as if appraising her. "Perhaps," she said at last, "I should change into something more appropriate. Follow me if you will."

"But what about-"

The half-lidded gaze flicked towards Tik-Tok, lingering for a moment on Bilina. "Your friends can stay here."

And without another word, she glided away, still holding Dorothy's hand. At that point, Dorothy wanted to protest; she wanted to wriggle free of Mombi's grip and demand that she explain where the Scarecrow was and why she'd been left alive while everyone else in the city had been turned to stone. But in spite of all that, she remained silent; after all, while she certainly didn't trust this strange woman yet, at the moment, she was their only hope of finding the Scarecrow. She'd just have to put up with her attitude problems- and hope that Tik-Tok would be able to reach them if things went badly.

So, she remained quiet and allowed Mombi to lead her towards the end of the hall, where a door almost lost in the banks of mirrors swung open for them, revealing an opulent master bedroom; thickly-carpeted, utterly without windows, and dominated by an enormous bed framed with conical pillars of white marble. Clearly not in the mood to waste time sightseeing, Mombi almost dragged her past the bedchamber, up a short flight of stairs and into an adjoining room that-

For the second time in as many minutes, Dorothy could only stop and stare at the contents of the room around her; the contents of the room obligingly stared back.

Every single wall of the room was lined with windowed cabinets; there looked to be at least thirty of them, paned with clear glass- and in the case of one at the furthest end of the room, with mirror. Inside each one, a human head was sitting on a pedestal, its eyes wide and expression blank. All of them were female, and all of them were beautiful; shockingly, they were also very much alive, and swivelling to watch the two of them as they passed.

At the far end of this chamber, one of the cabinets had been left conspicuously empty; here, Mombi finally released her hold and went about the business of unlocking the door. As the key (which was tied to her left wrist, interestingly enough) turned and the door swung open, Dorothy heard her mutter, "I think number four will do for this afternoon..." as she pulled her hair back to expose her neck.

_Is she going to-?_

_Oh my goodness, she _is...

Suddenly feeling the need to pay attention to other parts of the room, Dorothy saw that most of the cabinets were numbered; the head in cabinet #4 was as beautiful as the other heads, with dark hair, piercing blue eyes, and high cheekbones. However, there was no mistaking the expression of subtle dread on her face, or the pitying looks the other heads were giving her.

Meanwhile, Mombi was now closing the cabinet door and making her way across the room; with her back turned and the stump of her neck out of view, she looked merely stooped and hunched, but Dorothy knew- even before she saw the head occupying the previously-empty cabinet- that Mombi was now headless. Somehow, she found #4 and unlocked it despite not having eyes to see it with; but instead of fitting the head onto her shoulders, she turned around, holding it out for inspection.

"What do you think?" said the head in her arms. The horrified expression was gone, replaced by Mombi's arrogant smile.

After several deep breaths, Dorothy finally remembered her manners: "I think you're very beautiful," she said weakly.

"I should hope so." As Mombi's arms began fitting the new head onto her neck, she continued in a much sharper tone than before. "And who might _you_ be? What are you doing here?"

"I'm Dorothy Gale."

The moment she said those words, she instantly regretted it, for Mombi's eyes now focussed on her with newfound interest. "Dorothy Gale?" she echoed.

"Yes, Miss. I'm looking for the Scarecrow; would you know where he is, or-"

"Come closer."

Dorothy knew that this would be the worst thing she could possibly do under the circumstances, so it came as something of a surprise when she found herself beginning a long slow march towards the headless witch.

"The Nome King has the Scarecrow," Mombi explained. "When he invaded, he took him, the Emeralds, whatever else he wanted from this city, and took them back to his palace underneath the horned mountain. I'd say you missed them by about a week."

"A _week?_ But- but... the city looks as though it's been abandoned for thousands of years! There are forests where the Munchkin villages used to be-"

"And in the streets there are Wheeler corpses that look like they died a thousand years ago, but they were up and about just a day and a half ago. Do you think I've spent _all_ my time here just playing the mandolin?" There was a ragged, hysterical edge to her voice now, the calm, sing-song tone fading away with every word. "I've had to keep up with my work, and sometimes that work includes testing my knowledge of time magic on anything I can afford to waste: the ruins of this city, the Wheelers that rut and spawn in its filthy alleyways- they're _mine_ to waste!" She smiled, and added, "I can't take credit for all of it, though: the forest was the King's doing. As for why he made it in the first place, I couldn't care less. I'd imagine it's for the same reason why he invaded, but it's of no interest to me; anything the Nomes want to petrify a whole city over isn't worth knowing about."

"But why are you still alive? Why didn't the King turn _you_ to stone?"

"We have... an arrangement. If you really want to know more, you should ask him yourself; I could take you to him, if you like. But..."

She eyed her curiously; then, she reached out and held Dorothy's chin with one hand, turning her head slowly to the left and right, examining her face for the second time that day- only this time, she was studying it more closely, feeling the muscles underneath and tracing the contours of her features. If Mombi's gaze had felt unnerving a moment ago, now it felt downright _wrong:_ there was something predatory about it, something hungry. At that point, Dorothy was ready to take to her heels and run for her life, but she couldn't move: Mombi's stare seemed to hold her in place. Had she cast a spell, or was it just something to the eyes of the head she wore?

"You will be rather attractive one day," Mombi purred, licking her lips. "Not at all beautiful, you understand, but you have a certain... prettiness, different from my other heads. I think I'll keep you in the tower for a few years, and then, once it's ripe and ready for harvest- _I'll take it."_

* * *

Diggs looked quizzically at the ranks of Nomes assembled at the walls, then back at Elphaba. "I'm sorry," he murmured, "But I really have to ask: what the hell's going on?"

"This is Basalt," said Elphaba, who'd only just recovered the ability to speak. "He's Glinda's bodyguard... and unless I'm deeply mistaken, he's also my ally in the palace, and we now have an army at our disposal. An army of..." Her eyes darted around the room as she counted the Nomes that surrounded them. "Fifty Nomes in total. Basalt, where did you get these?"

"The workers' barracks, Miss Elphaba; from what I have learned since we last spoke, those of my rank are permitted to commandeer units of workers."

"In another words, we've just had a windfall so spectacular that one of the apples is bound to be poisonous."

Basalt's monolithic brow wrinkled. "What do you mean?"

"She means she doesn't trust you," said Diggs, bluntly. "And I honestly don't think you can blame her, either."

"This is true."

"Well, at the risk of drifting off topic, why do you want to help us? What do _you_ have to gain?"

"At present, allying myself with you and Miss Elphaba is the only way that I can serve my allotted purposes without betraying them and my people."

"What?"

There was a half-hour intermission, as the details were slowly explained: Basalt delivered a brief but comprehensive summary of the steps that had led him to discovering the Nome King's plans, and the decision he had made; Elphaba detailed virtually everything that had happened between their last meeting and now, from the Nome King's explanations and attempts at enticing her into his service, to the moment where Basalt had stolen the memory sphere. For good measure, she also pointed out that they had no other option but to trust Basalt, at least for the moment. By the time the explanations came to an end, Diggs appeared to be at a loss for words. Perhaps he was remembering the time when he'd tried to bargain with Elphaba and almost convinced her to work for him; maybe he was astonished that she'd refused the offer again. Maybe he was just trying to comprehend the varying facets of the long and complicated story he'd just been told. In any case, he took a deep breath, and asked, "So, you'll help us in return for ensuring that the King and the War Council are no longer in power by the end of the month; have I got that much right?"

"For the most part, Mr Diggs."

"For the most part?"

Basalt hesitated for a moment. "It is not important at the moment. I will explain later."

"You're being pretty damn optimistic in assuming there will be a later," said Diggs, eyes alight with mad cheerfulness. "We're still not even past the "what do we do to stop the King from turning us into ornamental gateposts" phase of the plan."

"Well get to that," said Elphaba. "Now, Basalt, what are these worker Nomes capable of?"

"Almost anything that involves construction, Miss Elphaba: they can dig tunnels and passages through the bedrock and fill them in if necessary; they can assemble complex designs if given the materials and adequate direction; they can even operate machinery if need be."

"Maybe that won't be necessary," muttered Diggs. Hauling himself towards the nearest row of workers with newfound enthusiasm, he began a hurried inspection of them, tentatively prodding their arms and skulls with long, twisted, nail-less fingers. "We've got an army, alright," he said at last. He was smiling now, and revealing far too many broken teeth. "I mean, if we've got Nomes on our side, why are we even bothering with my inventions? We can just fight our way through the palace with these workers as the vanguard!"

"I'm afraid that this would not be an amenable solution, Mr Diggs," said Basalt flatly. "Workers cannot commit acts of violence."

"That's a bit unfortunate, but if you're in charge of them, I'm pretty sure you can bend the rules in your favour-"

"You misunderstand; it is not merely a rule, but a physical incapability. They cannot be violent because they cannot understand it. Their minds cannot retain any knowledge in this field, and they cannot even countenance an order that would force them to kill or wound. They can only be used for assemblage and construction, and nothing else."

"But surely you can-"

Elphaba sighed in exasperation, and turned to the nearest worker. "You there," she commanded, "Punch me in the head."

There was no response. For the sake of emphasis, Basalt told the worker to accept orders from Elphaba, and asked her to repeat the previous command; this time, the worker looked uncomprehendingly at the two of them, and then bowed, as if in apology.

But Diggs refused to be disheartened: "Alright, alright, fair enough," he rambled, "they can't fight, but they can still construct, right? In that case, they can just build a tunnel that can take us all the way out of Nome territory. I mean, we can just leave and go as far as we like- maybe into Ev, maybe to one of the other neighbouring countries, anywhere outside the King's reach." He noticed the glare on Elphaba's face, and hastily added, "We aren't going to leave behind Glinda or anything like that- she'll come with us. That way, we get away from this mess as cleanly as possible, and Roquat's plan falls flat on its face -"

"_We aren't leaving,"_ Elphaba hissed.

There was a startled pause.

"There was something the King said at the end of our last discussion: "it's always important to keep an understudy or two around." Now, he also told me that when he captured Glinda, he wasn't planning on using her to translate the Grimmerie at first; she was a last-minute recruit, not one of the planned understudies. If that's the case, he probably has another substitute ready if Glinda and I escape; I mean, there must be some reason he's keeping Mombi hanging around in the Emerald City, right?"

"I suppose so," Diggs admitted, "but are we really turning to my inventions so soon? I mean, we've got a workforce and we've got a suitable blueprint, but what about materials, tools, machinery- that sort of thing?"

"The workers have access to the foundries and storehouses of the industrial regions," Basalt explained. "It might take some time for them to gather the necessary resources and equipment, but they will get them- workers are rarely considered worthy of suspicion unless they actually enter restricted areas."

"But... what if someone finds out what we're doing? What happens then? I mean, we've..."

Elphaba stood back and allowed the stream of concerns and complaints to rush onwards, waiting patiently for him to run out of niggling doubts to voice. It took about thirty seconds in all, and it ended in another coughing fit; as the wheezing and choking finally died away, leaving Diggs slumped exhaustedly against the wall, Elphaba whispered, "Do you really want the rest of your life down here? Don't you want to see the sun again?"

In spite of himself, Diggs managed something akin to a withering sneer. "I don't want to sound like an even bigger coward than usual, but I really doubt that seeing the sun will do me much good if I'm dead."

"Oh. And here I was, thinking you actually had some faith in your own inventions."

"... _what?"_

"In case you've forgotten, _your Ozness_, you built a whole empire around the machines you designed: the giant face, the mechanical props, the clockwork engines, the prototype trains- do I actually have to bolster your ego for a change? You've had a year to think about all those designs on the table, and from what you've told me, you've spent quite a bit of it wishing you'd actually devoted more time to inventing; don't you want a chance at that?"

Diggs hesitated, and in that moment, Elphaba played the only ace she had up her sleeve at that point; she'd never been especially persuasive or inclined to use persuasion, but right now, she had no choice. So, she took a deep breath, and allowed her face to soften into what she hoped was a look of desperate pleading. For good measure, she bit her lip. "I told you that you'd have to earn the right to call me your daughter," she said plaintively. "Don't you want that anymore?"

For several seconds, the former Wizard stood deathly still, face ashen and expressionless. Then, he looked down at the mangled lump of iron clenched in his fist, his lips moving faintly as he whispered a familiar incantation: "_Ferruseld Magnetifus Estrallivar Vekt,"_ the chant went, and to Elphaba's amazement, it was _working:_ the metal in his hand was beginning to warp and bubble out of shape as Diggs continued uttering the words of the spell, never speaking louder than a murmur as the chant slowly became a mantra, and his breathing grew slowly stronger; finally he threw the now-thimble-sized piece of iron aside and hobbled over to the blueprint left on the desk. His eyes scanned the page for a moment, and then he turned to the Nomes at the walls with newfound enthusiasm in his eyes.

"Right," he said firmly. "I can do this. _I can do this_." He turned around, and pointed his cane at the nearest worker; "You- I'm going to need tools for this job: screwdrivers, mallets, rivets, welding torches, tape measures- enough for everyone here. Get to it! You, you, you and _you- _see these plans? We're going to need three tons of steel in _this_ format. You six, get to work on casting the drill; keep those dimensions memorized. You over there, I'm going to need pistons and gears- like these ones. The rest of you, clear all this rubbish out of the way and see if you can expand the room- we need space to work!"

He stopped a minute, as the bustling Nome workers went about their business, and finally exhaled. "Goddamn, it's been so long since I last had a decent crew of mechanics," he mused aloud. He glanced back towards the cluster of workers burrowing their way through the back wall, and hollered, "Come on you lot, assholes and elbows! We've got a lot of work to do and not much time to waste!"

* * *

Much like the lower floors of the tower, the attic was a virtual warehouse of all the junk that Mombi had never bothered to get rid of. Most of it looked to have been taken from the other rooms of the palace- fine furniture, statues, paintings, and so on. There were even toys scattered around here amongst the dust and cobwebs. And at far end of the chamber, just clear of the colossal mounds of rubbish that dominated it, a massive window sat, allowing the pale glow of sunset to illuminate the room.

With no exits other than the wrought-iron gate that Dorothy had entered the room through, the attic now doubled as a perfect improvised prison for Mombi's newest guest.

Heart still pounding from being dragged up three flights of stairs at high speed, Dorothy tottered over to the window, hoping against hope that there might be some way of escaping through it. But no: the decorative iron grating had rusted the windows shut, and probably wouldn't budge for anything short of a cart crash. Besides, even if Dorothy could climb down from the balcony outside and escape from the palace, where would she go? What chance of finding the Scarecrow did she have, now that he was being held in a different country altogether? How could she even stay free from the Wheelers now that Tik-Tok had been left motionless downstairs?

Sighing in despair, she wiped away some of the grime that layered the windowpane, and found herself staring out across the eastern half of the Emerald City, and into the forest-covered remains of Munchkinland. And beyond that, past the tiny band of white and gold that passed for the Deadly Desert, past the barren plain of rock that lay beyond it, stood the shape of a mountain. Even at this distance, she could just discern the vaguely bull's-horn shape to the peak.

"The Nome King's Mountain," she murmured.

Now she knew where to go.

But how was she supposed to get there?

Bilina had just recovered from her own rough handling by Mombi, and was now perched on an ancient dining room chair. "No offence," she clucked, "But if this is the Oz you spent the last year wanting to visit, I'd rather take my chances back in Kansas.

"You were due for the chopping block back in Kansas," Dorothy pointed out.

"True, but that's the sort of thing you get used to when you're a chicken. Here, someone's trying to kill me every other minute of the day."

And in spite of herself, Dorothy couldn't argue. When she'd last been here, Oz had seemed so impossibly beautiful, so effortlessly _magical_. Yes, it had been dangerous; yes, it had been terrifying at some points; and yes, she'd almost been killed at one point. But Oz had been the first real journey outside Kansas she'd ever taken, and it had been where she'd met her three closest friends; she'd been so enamoured with it that she'd had to keep on reminding herself that she needed to go home- and once she'd done so, she'd spent the next twelve months wondering if it was really worth it. And now that she was back again...

She glanced around the room, looking for something comfortable to sit down on... and instead settled upon a framed portrait left sitting in a corner; it was half-covered by a small stack of other paintings and shrouded with cobwebs, but Dorothy could still recognize the distinctive faces of the Cowardly Lion, the Tin Man, and the Scarecrow- wearing the mock crown the rejoicing citizens had given him. Judging by the date in the corner of the frame, it had been painted less than a day after Dorothy had left Oz.

Looking down at those smiling faces, Dorothy remembered how she'd found the Tin Man and the Lion back in the ruined streets, their expressions frozen in snarls of rage and fear, their bodies streaked with graffiti. A year ago, that thought might have driven her to tears; now, she felt only numbness.

And then, just as she was trying to think of anything other than her lost friends, a voice whispered, "Mom?"

Heart thundering, Dorothy peered around the debris, looking for the source of the voice. It seemed to be coming from the left of the stack of paintings, just past a vase of dead palm fronds. Brushing them aside, she found herself staring at what was undoubtedly the oddest thing in the entire room: it was shaped more or less like a human being- in the sense that it had the same number of arms and legs- but it was impossibly tall and thin, or at least it would have been if it hadn't been left slumped against a pile of furniture. Its limbs on body were little more than tree branches tied together, and its clothes looked like things that the Scarecrow would have thrown away rather than wear. But its most distinctive and unlikeliest feature was its head: a large pumpkin carved into a jack-o-lantern.

"Mom?" the thing called. "Is that you?"

After a few seconds of blinking, Dorothy finally managed to say "No," in what she hoped was an apologetic tone. "I'm Dorothy Gale," she continued.

"Oh," the jack-o-lantern said, obviously disappointed. "For a second there, I thought my mom had come back."

Bilina looked sceptically down at the pile of branches and gaudy clothes. "What is this?" she squawked. "A man or a melon?"

"A pumpkin, if you please. My name's Jack. Jack Pumpkinhead." Turning to Dorothy, he said (Raising his voice over Bilina's muttering of _what-kind-of-a-name-is-Jack-Pumpkinhead), _"If I could ask a favour of you, Dorothy- could you please check my head for signs of spoiling?"

As she went about prodding Jack's head for soft spots, Dorothy absently reflected on how strange her life had become over the last two years; it still seemed a tad ridiculous when she looked back on half of it, and more than a little bit crazy when the whole mess started adding up. _No wonder they thought I was crazy,_ she thought to herself. Out loud, she said, "It feels fine- no soft spots at all."

Jack breathed a sigh of relief. "Thank you; I've been alive such a short while, and I'm afraid I'll spoil before I see anything of the world outside this attic. Uh, could you help put some of the rest of me together? Some of the knots have slipped in the last few days; there's the leg... and that arm there..." As Dorothy began tying the knots around Jack's left arm, he suddenly asked, "You're sure you're not my mom?"

"I'm sure. But who is your mother? What's her name?"

"I don't know; she never had a chance to tell me her name. I know she was Mombi's servant back in the old days, before I ended up here; my mother built me to scare Mombi, as a joke. She stood me in a field, and had me ready to spring out at the witch as soon as she passed. It worked, too: she _was_ scared... but then she was angry. And she has a _terrible_ temper..."

"I found that out the hard way," Dorothy remarked, as she began retying the knots on Jack's leg. "But where'd she get those other... heads?"

"Did you see the headless dancing girls outside?"

"Oh."

"Anyway, Mombi was going to destroy me, but she changed her mind at the last minute; she decided to test some Powder of Life she'd bought from a magician that day. She did, and it worked." He briefly fell silent as Dorothy helped him to his feet; for a moment, he stood there, almost seven feet tall and quaking like a leaf. Then he shrugged: "So, here I am," he finished."

There was a pause, as Dorothy reviewed everything she'd just been told. "Powder of Life?" she echoed.

"You sprinkle it on something, and the thing comes to life," said Jack simply.

"Does Mombi have any more of it?"

Jack thought for a moment. "If she does, it's in cabinet #31, with her original head."

And with that, Dorothy's mind was in motion again; never in her entire life had she found herself thinking so quickly and so clearly, juggling possibilities and fitting them together like pieces of a jigsaw. Her eyes scanned the room at such a speed she swore they left scorch-marks on the wall, her gaze briefly settling on random bits of junk- the animal head on the wall, the sofa leaning against the wall, the vase of palm fronds. There was a plan forming in her head- a seedling of one at least. It was undoubtedly risky, but it was the only way they'd be able to escape the ruins and reach the Nome King's Mountain.

"What happened to your mother?" Bilina asked, a few thousand miles away from Dorothy's frantic thoughts.

"She disappeared; after she built me and set me up in the field I never saw her again; I think Mombi must have enchanted her."

"But what are you doing up here in the attic?"

"Mombi threw me in this corner when she first moved into this tower; she said she was going to make a pie out of me... but she was wearing head #22 at the time, and mustn't have worn it since then, because she hasn't remembered I'm up here..."

_Just as well,_ Dorothy thought, _because if Mombi knew she had somebody in the attic with arms long enough unlock the gate from the inside, she might have thought twice before leaving me up here!_

* * *

One by one, the worker Nomes were slowly filing back into the room, each of them carrying the promised payload of materials or equipment; none of them seemed to have run into any trouble on the way there or back, so, once Basalt had checked the perimeter to make sure none of the guards had noticed the cell's existence, they set to work. Diggs once again proved himself surprisingly adept at directing the workers, and after a few minor misunderstandings that left him staring in mute horror as workers started hammering rivets with their bare fists, he gradually settled into the role almost without supervision.

This left Elphaba and Basalt standing at the back of the room, watching the construction rumble along before their eyes; occasionally, Basalt would leave the room to check the perimeter, but for the most part, they had nothing to do but plan what was going to happen next- and that was a slow, ponderous job.

At one point, Elphaba found herself massaging her temples, and saying, "You said that you had other reasons for helping us..."

"Not exactly; I meant that there was something else I would ask in return for your assistance- something only you would be able to provide, Miss Elphaba."

"Name it, then."

Basalt hesitated, his face briefly contorting into an expression that reminded Elphaba of Doctor Dillamond, in those awful moments where his rational mind briefly gave way to animal confusion. Eventually, the Nome cleared his throat, and said, "As Miss Glinda's Protector, I have been magically bonded to her to prevent any kind of laxness in my duties that may result from my lack of emotions; in the event that we do succeed, I will most likely be a fugitive and hence unable to have this connection removed by any of my superior. Given that I will have no place working with Glinda after this, the bond will likely drive me insane, and..." He stopped, mouth hanging open for several seconds, apparently unable to speak.

"And you want it removed," Elphaba finished.

"By force, if necessary; the bond makes it difficult to consider dereliction of duty- or anything else that might prevent me from keeping Glinda safe unless promotion is involved. Is it possible that you could sever it?"

Elphaba's mind raced, thinking back to every single possible reference to magical bonds she heard of back in Magic Class, to the subtler of spells contained within the Grimmerie, to any of the spellbooks she'd read in the past few months that had anything remotely to do with magical bonds. "There's no guarantee that any of my attempts," she said at last. "Once I've got access to my magic and the Grimmerie, I'll do what I can to help you, but there's no way of telling just how difficult it's going to be until then."

"I understand; I can ask no more of you than I already have."

For several minutes, there was silence- at least between the two of them, for the construction was always producing some kind of noise. Elphaba tried to occupy herself with thinking about what to do next, but her attention always seemed to drift back towards worrying; Basalt seemed to have no problem keeping himself occupied, on the other hand: he stood perfectly still by her side without so much as twitching, perhaps the same way he'd watched over Glinda in the past few days.

Eventually, Basalt once again left the room to check the perimeter. When he returned, he found Elphaba toying with a sphere of fire no bigger than a marble. "I thought that the Nome King was keeping your powers nullified," he said, confusion evident in his voice.

"He is," Elphaba agreed, her teeth clenched in concentration. "It's just that... every now and again, the pressure he's keeping on my magic loosens slightly, and I can cast a few simple-"

Without warning, the ball of fire evaporated with a hiss, and Elphaba sighed in disappointment. "Damn it," she grumbled. "That was the longest time yet. Anyway, I think his attention is being drawn elsewhere, away from the nullification."

"This is possible," Basalt conceded. "He may be concerned over the approach of the War Council."

"Maybe, maybe not. But this isn't the first time he's shown signs of losing control over his magic: back when we were first captured, he lost his temper, and burned Curter to death without meaning to."

"And you think this may be a weakness we can use against him?"

"Assuming he wasn't just trying to make excuses for killing someone, possibly. I mean, we haven't even figured out if I'm right about this, but if I am, we might be able to stop him from attacking with his full power if we get him confused and angry enough. At the very least, we might be able to get my magic back."

"It may take a lot of work and planning to induce this, Miss Elphaba; if we make a mistake, we risk merely being killed outright as was the refugee you mentioned." Basalt's brow furrowed again, and he added, "There is another problem we must face soon, as well: I cannot be present when the attack is launched on the King, and neither can any of the workers. When he gives a direct order, we cannot resist it."

"We'll cross that bridge when we reach it," said Elphaba wearily. This was turning out to be much more complicated than she'd originally intended. "Right now, I'd just settle for having my magic back. Or anything else that would hold this oversized tin can together, or... or..." Her face froze; once again, she'd had that wonderful feeling of a brainstorm rushing through her skull. _"The rune plates!"_ she shouted, punching the air.

Some of the workers turned around at the noise, and Diggs would have jumped in surprise had it not been for the frame supporting his twisted limbs. Basalt merely looked puzzled.

"The rune plates that were attached to the carpets!" Elphaba whooped. "They're still up on the plateau- we can use them on the hull of this machine!" Her heart jumped again as another realization struck her. "My bag and broomstick are up there too!"

"With the way you're jumping for joy I'm surprised you need the damn thing," Diggs remarked snidely, but Elphaba didn't seem to hear.

"The explosive shells as well," she continued, almost glowing in jubilation. "If we can salvage them and the launchers, we won't have to waste time making our own... but we'll need more hands to actually fire the rockets- we're going to need Woolwax down here too, and..." She stopped and took a very deep breath. "Basalt, I'm going to need all of those down here as soon as possible. If some of workers can find Woolwax's cell or the crash site up on the surface-"

"No need, Miss Elphaba," said the Protector solemnly. "I can handle the surface duties myself."

* * *

Out on the plateau, it was almost twilight, and the crimson light of the sunset was slowly fading into darkness; in the shallow crater where the refugees had landed, however, there was still enough light for Javelin to see the ground by.

It had taken the gazelle quite a while to shake off his pursuers and find his way back to the crash site; glad though he was for managing the escape in the first place, he knew he needed to make it worthwhile- to try and find some way of helping the survivors of the massacre he'd fled from. He should have at least gotten Elphaba to follow, but he'd given up too easily; as a gazelle, he'd been taught to run at the first sign of trouble and trust that the rest of the herd could follow at the same speed, but his conscience still scalded when he remembered looking back at the crash site and realising that none of the refugees had been able to get out in time.

But, after so many hours of travelling across the trackless wastes, he was back at the edge of the site, and ready to render what help he could. He'd been expecting to find carnage here, with bodies strewn from one end of the crash site to the next, or at the very least some sign that mass murder had took place, perhaps a tunnel entrance that he could reach the Nome prison by. But, to his surprise, the site actually looked a lot cleaner than when he'd last been here. The bodies of those who'd died in the crash were gone, and while the bloodstains they'd left were still there, there was nothing new about the place except for a scorch mark left in the middle of the area.

"Hello?" he called. "Is anyone there?"

Silence.

"Is anyone alive out there? Hello!"

And from somewhere just out of view, at least six different voices answered in unison: "Javeliiiiiiiin?" From behind a large boulder at the edge of the site, _something_ stirred and shifted; at this distance, it was impossible to guess at what it really was, for it wore a heavy cloak that obscured most of its imposing figure, with the exception of its long serpentine arms and nine-fingered hands, which dragged limply along the ground as it drew nearer. It was still whispering Javelin's name, too, allowing him to hear the same inexplicable chorus of voices emerging from beneath the hood.

As it lurched to halt in front of him, Javelin realised that the cloak had clearly been made from scraps of the two carpets, sewn crudely together with twine and draped over the thing's shoulders. It was this sight that finally brought him rushing back to reality at that moment, and forced him to think of just who or what this creature was: unless he'd somehow found himself in the presence of a demon or some other omniscient monster, he was almost certainly talking to one of the surviving refugees- one that had managed to escape from Nome captivity, probably after being tortured.

"Who are you?" he whispered, trying not to sound too horrified.

"It's... it's..." The voices temporarily ceased, and a single, quavering voice emerged from the refugee's mouth: "It's Brollan."

"_Brollan?_ What happened to you? Were you tortured?"

"How could I have been tortured?" snapped all five voices. "I wasn't captured." Brollan cringed. "Sorry... it's so hard to speak clearly... so many vocal chords... so many _mouths..."_

"Mouths? What are you talking about? What happened?"

Something under Brollan's cloak hissed and slathered unpleasantly. "I used... Itried to use Elphaba's spell notebook. I thought I could bring Moleburr back, but all I did was... was..." There was another grotesque hissing sound, and for a moment, Javelin thought he could see _things_ moving under the tattered fabric of the cloak. "The bodies," Brollan groaned. "The spell did something to them. They're all here... they're _on_ me! They _are _me!"

"Brollan, calm down; just take off the cloak, and we'll see how badly hurt you are-"

"No!"

Javelin edged closer, trying to get a decent look at the face under the hood. "Look," he cajoled, "it can't be that horr-"

"_DON'T LOOK AT ME!"_ Brollan howled, six different voices wailing in rage and grief, and before Javelin's eyes, the Gilikin seemed to grow by several feet; the writhing shapes under the cloak now rippled outwards along his arms, emerging as long, taloned "fingers" and boneless tendrils that clawed wildly at the air. In the flurry of action, Brollan's hood fell back, and before he could pull it back, Javelin got a heart-stopping glimpse of twisted mass of rolling eyes and gnashing jaws that now comprised the businessman's face: the head itself seemed to be splitting itself in three, with the gaping mouth spread not just across their faces but down the colossal neck that supported them, and the eyes now sat in sockets dotted from the face to the collarbone; his blonde hair was gone from the top of his head, now dangling from the back of his head in a long, matted tangle alongside four other plaits of red, brown and grey. Then the hood slipped back over the misshapen skull, and the horrid visage was gone.

"Please, Javelin, look away, please just look away..."

It took all of Javelin's self control not to run at that point. With his heart pounding like all the drums of a symphony orchestra, he could only stand there and direct his gaze as far away from Brollan's hooded face as possible. "How long have you been out here like this?"

"Feels like hours; spent a little of it trying to fly away on Elphaba's broom once I found it- too heavy for it, in the end- spent the rest trying to deal with all these new limbs and... things. I never thought I'd say it, but I'm glad these poor bastards were dead when they became me. Living with their bowels has been bad enough; can you imagine what it'd be like trying to deal with their thoughts?" He laughed bitterly.

Javelin thought carefully. "Wasn't Mrs Heckson one of the dead?"

"Don't remind me," grumbled Brollan, the voice of a young woman briefly emerging from the chaos of his laryx. "I've got to live with having the damn girl grafted to my back. I 'spose it doesn't really matter: we're already stuck out in the middle of Oz-only-knows-where, we've got no food, no water, no way of getting home, no home; we're probably going to die anyway, so no point in worrying who's gonna see how much I've changed, is it?" The bitter, broken chuckle sounded again.

"If it's any help, Brollan, that's not the only way you've changed."

"Oh? And how's that?"

"You haven't called me a goat yet."

"Oh. I'm sorry; I've had other things on my mind." Groaning, the mangled shape under the cloak lowered himself to the ground, and sat. "Yes," he mused aloud. "Lots and lots of things; hearts, brains, livers, lungs, and all that other crap. I've got six of each, now."

There was a long silence.

"After the... after what happened to the Animals, was there anyone they brought back after the Wizard left- anyone... like me?"

"That's another way you've changed. A day ago, you'd have refused to believe that Wizard had a movement against Animal Rights."

"Quite frankly, Jav, I couldn't give a shit what really happened; Oz is dead, its people are dead, the two of us are dead, and any proof of what really happened is dead and buried just like everything else that the Nomes destroyed. Truth doesn't matter anymore. So just... please- was anyone like me there, someone mangled like me?"

"Nobody was _exactly_ like you, but yes, there were a lot of Animals who'd been physically ruined by their time in captivity."

"How bad was it?"

Javelin closed his eyes, and very slowly sat down. "After Glinda shut down the specialists and released the Animals that'd been imprisoned, a lot of them came back crippled for life. I remember, them moving back into my neighbourhood, this _procession _of crippled Animals slowly dragging their way down the street." He shook his head, trying to stop thinking back to the awful memory of the sight, and continued: "As far as we knew, the specialists that had operated on them hadn't been trying to kill them; they wanted silent beasts, not dead Animals. Some of them amputated tongues and vocal chords, some of them "disciplined" Animals with electric shocks- gave them jolts every time they were heard speaking, until they finally "learned their lesson." A few had been poisoned with things that the specialists thought could destroy their minds. And In some cases, the specialists had decided that they couldn't stamp out sentience for good, so they... they decided to stop the "plague" from spreading to the next generation in the only way they felt was practical. One by one, the prisoners would trickle back to their families in whatever condition they'd been left in: blind, dumb, insane, invalid... they needed to be cared for, they couldn't look after themselves. I had relatives who'd returned barely able to speak, barely able to eat without help; they'd wake up at night, screaming, begging for mercy. And my aunt, she... she'd always wanted to have children, you see. And after what they did to her, she..."

He couldn't finish; his throat was too clenched for speech. For almost a minute, he sat there, quivering with nerves as he tried to slow his breathing down.

"There was one returning victim," he said at last. "I think he was a carthorse prior to the experiments. He told me that one or two specialists tried something different with him, something they kept top secret; even Glinda's reps couldn't confirm what happened, because all the files on him had been incinerated. You see, a rare few specialists believed that Animals were just humans with animal forms, souls trapped in the wrong body. From what this horse told me, they believed that brainwashing was not the way to solve the Animal problem- it "destroyed the Animal's dignified human soul"- so they started a program of transforming Animals into humans."

"You're _serious?"_

"Deadly serious. It didn't involve magic, either; there weren't enough magicians among the specialists to transfigure them. They used surgery instead- straightening the spine, amputating hooves or claws and replacing them with hands and feet, restructuring the face, shaving the fur. The survivor I met could barely walk on all fours, let alone upright; they'd done their best to shorten his skull and remove his hair, even replaced a few of his internal organs. And he told me there were even worse ones- foxes who'd ended up looking like flayed monkeys, birds who'd never fly again..."

"What happened to them?"

"They died. All of them died, one after the other; most were killed by mistake on the operating table, and the rest committed suicide- they couldn't take the pain and the shock of what'd been done to them. My friend, the carthorse, he died of heart failure." Javelin felt his face twist into a bitter smile. "They'd replaced it, you see. Even with all the drugs and all the healing magic they gave him and all the mechanical valves and pumps they added to it, a human heart couldn't keep his body going."

There was a deathly silence, as Javelin waited for the inevitable panic attack to strike, for the rage and despair to kick in as Brollan started wondering just how long it took for his new body to finally burn out. Instead, the Gilikin remained as still as ever, and when he spoke, his voice seemed calmer than before: "I understand," he said softly, his own voice dominant this time. "I understand. I know I can't compare myself to them, but I understand."

Javelin smiled. "You _have_ changed."

"Moleburr's dead. He's in here with the rest of them, but he's dead... and I've got to be like he said I should be. I can't act like I used to, not with him gone."

And then, from just a few feet to their right, there was a muffled crunch. In perfect unison, they turned: there, standing less than ten feet away from them was the imposing figure of a Nome. Clutched in his right hand was Elphaba's broomstick.

In the split second before Brollan lunged, Javelin caught a brief glimpse of his distorted muscles tensing under the cloak, and heard, from what felt like a few thousand miles away, his own voice yelling, "wait!" But by the time he'd finished shouting, the mad Gilikin was already soaring through the air: before the Nome could raise a hand to defend itself or even move out of the way, Brollan was on top of it; with a thunderous crash, the two of them fell to the ground, the ex- businessman clawing at the Nome's shoulders with his talon-like fingers. For a second or two, it actually looked as though Brollan was going to win; then, before Javelin's eyes, the Nome disappeared into the ground, leaving Brollan splayed pathetically over the spot where his opponent had been.

"You bastard," he snarled. "You _bastard! _Come back! I had you! _I HAD YOU!"_

_Okay,_ Javelin thought, _he obviously hasn't changed_ that _much._

"Where the hell are you? WHERE ARE YOU?"

"More importantly," said Javelin carefully, "What did it want with the broomstick?"

"Dammnit, _I_ don't know? Why are you asking me?"

There was a polite cough from some distance behind them, and a monotone voice announced, "If I could beg your indulgence for a minute, sirs, I have a proposition that may interest you..."

* * *

Somewhere in the stygian darkness of the tunnels beneath the plateau, the crumpled heap known as Quintether Rasp stirred weakly as he once again went through the awkward process of lurching in and out of consciousness, wheezing with the effort of drawing breath with half his ribs shattered.

His eyes flickered open, and scanned the lightless corridors, trying to remember where he was and how he got there- and promptly clenched shut in despair as his memories returned. He was aware that he probably should have died the first time he'd lost consciousness; he'd lost so much blood and broken so many bones, and there should have been so many things in these caverns just waiting to feast on tender Munchkin flesh...

What had awoken him this time? Had he felt the rock walls around him shifting, or was this just the sort of thing you dreamt about when you'd lost a few gallons of blood and broken virtually every bone in your body?

He tried to move, but his limbs barely quivered in response; his injuries had left him virtually paralysed from blood loss. _Oh well,_ he thought. _I suppose my luck couldn't hold out forever. Still, I'd have liked to... to see the others again... wherever they are right now. I suppose I'm still a bit on the luckier side... I thought it would hurt more than this..._

Rasp felt himself drifting away from consciousness once again, the pain of his wounds leaving him as he began spiralling off into sleep once more- a sleep which he probably wouldn't awake from, he reflected absently. However, this time, as he felt himself floating away from his heavy, crippled body, he thought he could hear someone whispering his name from somewhere in the distance. Was he really dying this time? Was he about to meet all his dead friends and relatives? Would the other refugees be here? Would his predecessors?

"Not all of them," whispered a soothing voice. "But you will meet one."

Who was that, and why did it sound so familiar?

"You'll know in a second or two. Now, Rasp, I want you to open your eyes."

This took considerable effort; apparently, someone had replaced his eyelids with lead shutters while he was unconscious. Eventually, though, he finally managed to get enough control over his facial muscles to force one eyelid open; rather unsurprisingly, he found himself looking out at a completely different world. Surprisingly, said world bore an uncanny resemblance to the study of the old Governor's mansion, right down to the chair that Rasp was sitting in. This time, though, the room had been meticulously cleaned and dusted; the curtains were open, revealing a dark evening sky behind the polished glass; there was a roaring fire in the heart; every single gas lamp in the room had been lit... and there was a figure sitting at the desk in front of him.

It had been several months since he'd done that crucial bit of digging through the archives, but a thousand years couldn't couldn't erase the memory of the face he'd seen in that dog-eared photograph- the face that now looked back at him from the governor's chair. In many ways, it was a beautiful face- pale, slender and dark-haired, with a smiled that looked at once pleasant and melancholic; however, there was no changing the fact that this face belonged to one of the most notorious dictators in Ozian history, and Rasp was now sitting in the presence of Governor Nessarose Thropp.

Rasp's first instinct was to lurch backward in alarm, but his muscles refused to budge; further attempts to move had about the same amount of success. He could still turn his head to the left and right, but other than that, he was completely paralysed. Fear flooding his veins, Rasp opened his mouth to ask where he was, why he was here, and why he was sitting in the presence of the Wicked Witch of the East- or at the very least, to ask why he couldn't move- but all that emerged was incomprehensible mumbling.

"Don't be afraid, Quintether," said Nessarose, gently. "And don't try to move just yet; you need to hold on to as much of your strength as possible. You'll be able to speak clearly in a moment or two."

There was a long pause, as Rasp's breathing slowly steadied. Eventually, he managed to whisper, "Am I dead?"

"No. Not yet, anyway."

"Argh. Makes sense. Am I dreaming, then?"

"More or less; you're dreaming, but it's no ordinary dream."

"That could mean a lot of things; for all I know, this could be a hallucination brought on by blood loss and infection."

"It could," Nessarose conceded. "This might be your last feverish dream before you finally die; or, it could be an illusion sent by the Nome King to toy with your senses; you might not even be here at all- you could be at home in bed, dreaming of things that could never happen. Or maybe, just maybe, this is my way of keeping you alive."

"How is a dream supposed to keep me alive? Are you healing me or something?"

"I'm a ghost, Quintether: the dead aren't especially good at healing the living... not that I was any good at it in life," she added, her smile more sorrowful than ever. "All I can do is keep your soul from leaving your body altogether, at least until you can be rescued."

Rasp smothered the urge to roll his eyes; his body was currently sitting in the deepest darkest tunnels of Nome territory, critically injured and bleeding to death; in the past hours, he'd seen absolutely no traffic along said tunnel, and no hope of anyone finding him. More to the point, nobody was going to be looking for him anyway- as far as the King and the refugees were concerned, he'd died in the aftermath of the crash. So, speaking realistically, who in all of Oz was going to rescue him?

Another question occurred to him, and he voiced it as best as he could: "Why me?"

"Sorry?"

"Why'd you decide to help me? Why are you here?"

"You could call it an issue of protocol, if you like: us governors have to stick together."

"Very funny," Rasp wheezed mirthlessly. "But that wasn't what I meant; if this isn't the afterlife, then why are you still in the land of the living?"

Nessarose' smile faded. "Because I haven't been able to leave," she said softly. "As a matter of fact, I've spent the last year trapped in Nome territory, unable to be seen or heard by anyone except the dead and dying; I haven't even been able to move too far away from the Nome King's palace until a couple of days ago."

Noticing her audience's incredulous expression, she explained. "The world is changing, Rasp; I've been trapped here long enough to see how. It's a slow, almost unnoticeable process, but after months of watching the King's experiments at work, the damage is becoming impossible to ignore. Holes are beginning to form in the barrier between realities, and slowly but surely, ghosts are flooding in: I was only the first of many to tumble back into the physical world. And that's not even getting into what will happen if the Nome King's plan succeeds." She took a deep breath. "Truth to be told, the only reason why I was brought back at all was because the King happens to have in his possession something that used to belong to me."

Rasp blinked; by now, his breathing was steady enough for him to say, "You're joking," with all the incredulity it required.

"Not in the slightest."

"Are you actually implying what I think you're implying?

"Could you think of anything else I owned that could hold any kind of magical power?"

"Governor Thropp-"

To Rasp's utter astonishment, the long-dead Governor blushed; the Wicked Witch of the East was _blushing_ before his eyes_._ "Please," she almost giggled, "Call me Nessa; I haven't held the post of Governor for a year- that honour goes to you."

"Don't remind me. Anyway- Nessa, how the hell would the King have gotten the Ruby Slippers in the first place?"

"Elphaba can explain that much to you when you meet her again; from what I've been able to see, our gracious host's plan hinged on actually _telling_ her at least half of his plan for world domination."

"Fair enough, but you still haven't told me why we're having this conversation in the first place; if you don't need somebody to warn Elphaba about the Slippers, why are you keeping me alive?"

"Does there really have to be some grand plan behind everything? Truth to be told, I'm just happy for the company; I've been on my own for the better part of a year- even the ghosts that have started leaking into this reality aren't that sociable, and believe me, listening to the Nome King monologue is not a decent substitute for conversation." She sighed deeply. "Who knows? Maybe it's divine punishment for everything I did to the Munchkins; maybe it's just bad luck. What do you think?"

Rasp thought carefully. "I don't think anything you did in life deserves eternal loneliness as a punishment. I know you were a despot- I've had family members who were facing life sentences just for trying to leave the country, so I know that much about you- but after everything I read about you in the archives and everything Elphaba told me, I also know you weren't deliberately cruel. You only wanted-"

"To keep Boq with me. Does that justify everything? Does that make me so easily redeemed?"

"I don't know, Nessa. I've never governed more than a hundred people; I've never had to deal with real politics; I've never even been in love. I'm just a secretary playing at being a governor, and from where I'm standing, you were still a much better governor than I am."

Somewhere in the distance, there was a low rumbling of rock grinding against rock.

"Now that I think of it," said Nessa thoughtfully, "There is something you can do: when you meet up with Elphaba again, she'll have her crystal ball with her; get her to look in the palace's southern cellars. There's something there she needs to see. It'd take too long to explain, and I don't have all the details anyway, but Elphaba needs to know what's being readied down there."

"And if I die before anyone finds me?"

For a moment, Nessa was silent. "My death wasn't as quick as most people thought," she said at last. "I wasn't instantly crushed to death under the Gale house; the magic contained within the Ruby Slippers kept me alive, hovering between life and death, paralysed and just conscious enough to be aware of the world around me. And then, of course, the Slippers were taken before they could heal my wounds. It took seventeen hours before I finally succumbed, and for every single minute of that time, I was in agony, unable to move or even call for help. In the end, I died alone; nobody ever knew that I was still alive beneath the house; Elphaba never learned that I could have been saved." She shook her head sadly. "I know that I've done things that can't be forgiven, much less justified; I know that, as I am now, I can never atone for less than half the crimes I committed as Governor... but the least I can do is to keep you alive until you can be saved. And if you die before help comes, then at least you won't have died alone."

There was another deathlike silence as Rasp digested this information.

"Thank you," he said quietly.

"What can I say? Us governors have to stick together."

"Even if I've never been officially made governor? Even If I've made a total botch-up of it?"

"You haven't made a total botch-up of it; the fact that the other refugees are still alive should tell you that much."

"But that doesn't really change the fact that we're still at rock bottom, does it?"

"No. But the funny thing is- and I only learned this _after_ I died, ironically enough- that once you've reached the bottom, you actually have a chance of swimming to the surface."

And then, from somewhere in the distance, there came the sound of grinding rock, and a familiar but impossibly far-off voice echoed, _"Hold on just a minute! What's that over there?"_

"_We cannot afford to stop for long, Mr Javelin; there may be patrols in the area."_

"Who's that?" Rasp asked.

"That," said Nessa, smiling beatifically, "Is your rescue."


	30. Another Answer, Another Flight

A/N: Well, ladies and gentlemen, I'm pleasantly surprised that I managed to deliver a new chapter within the month; as promised, it's shorter than the previous chapter- said previous chapter was 12000 words long, this one's only 7500. Yay! Before we begin, I'd like to thank all of you for your comments and queries.

Wile E. Coyote: Yes, death does exist in this version of Oz; that's one of the things I found a bit iffy about the original Oz books- the fact that a certain Witch (who really _was_ melted in the first book, sadly) is still alive, clogging up a drain somewhere. Death- to a certain extent- was present in _Return to Oz _and the novel version of _Wicked; _there was even a miniscule amount in the musical, extremely distant though it might have been (no Dr Dillamond having his throat cut there. No Morrible having her face smashed in with a trophy... unfortunately). As always, I have to fuse the rules of the universes as carefully as possible; you'll have to be the judge of how well I do so.

unusual individual: Holy _shit. _I'd never imagined this story would ever warrant an article on tvtropes. Wow. I'm amazed, here- I honestly didn't think it would make it as far as that. Thank you very much, dear reviewer- you've truly made my week.

In the meantime, I'd best introduce the chapter before my head explodes in astonishment: this is where the climax to the _Return to Oz_ plot is introduced. I hope you enjoy it. So, without further ado, read, review and enjoy!

Disclaimer: Wicked does not belong to me. Neither does Return to Oz, the Oz book series, or tvtropes for that matter.

* * *

"Hold him still! I can't stop him from bleeding to death if he keeps twitching like this! No, not like that- you'll break his arms doing that! Basalt, we're going to need more bandages and bone sealant over here!"

Twelve extremely crowded minutes ago, Basalt had returned from his voyage to the surface, carrying the objects he'd set out to retrieve; unexpectedly, he'd also brought back Javelin, a cloaked figure identified as Brollan, and the crumpled, barely-alive body of Quintether Rasp. Once the inevitable barrage of questions was over and done with (with only the bare minimum of answers provided to either side) Elphaba had the workers gather all the medical supplies they could carry, and went to work on Rasp's many injuries.

For someone who'd never had any formal training in medicine, it was all uphill: experience in first aid and a few books on human anatomy didn't exactly prepare you for full-blown operations, and the fact that she couldn't even consistently access her own magic didn't help much. In the brief moments where she regained control of her powers, she could use a few simple diagnostic spells, and they were weak and faltering at best.

And while the Nome storehouses came equipped with most of the supplies necessary for the task (from simple gauze bandages to magical healing equipment- all of it intended for use in torturing human captives, according to Basalt) did help a lot, there was no way of actually telling whether any of the more _internal_ cures actually had the desired effect. Once Brollan and Basalt had held Rasp still enough to actually operate on him, it was easy enough to bind the wounds and stop the bleeding; but when it came to setting and mending the bones, Elphaba had to wonder if the ossification sceptres actually worked at all. Sure, Rasp's condition wasn't _worsening,_ but there was no way of telling if they'd knitted the ribcage back together correctly until he woke up.

_That'd be in line with our luck, wouldn't it?_ She thought sarcastically. _Having the poor bastard healed down to the slightest papercut, and then seeing him die because we accidently grew a rib through his heart._

Rasp coughed weakly. At the moment, he looked a mess: his clothes were torn, his skin was pale, and his body was streaked with blood and covered with bruises and heavily-bandaged wounds. And this was what he looked like _after_ the miraculous recovery he'd made on the operating table (or more accurately, the operating blanket). All things considered, it was a mystery how he'd managed to survive this long without bleeding to death or picking up an infection.

On the other hand, there were other things to be worried about at least as far as the acting-governor's heath went. For example: when was he going to wake up? How long would his coma last- if it ended at all? There didn't appear to be any head injuries among the multitude of other wounds that Rasp had suffered, but then again, Elphaba count recite at least a few dozen other subtle problems that could keep the Munchkin governor comatose for life, and without advanced diagnostic spells, there was no way of telling if any of them were currently afflicting him. For now, the only sign of cognition he was displaying was the faint movements of his lips; that might have been Rasp talking in his sleep, or it might have been something inside his skull long past repair, twitching its last.

There was very little any of them could do about it for the moment; all they could do was bandage the last of Rasp's wounds, and hope that his condition didn't worsen.

In the meantime, Elphaba slowly got to her feet, and stretched. "Okay," she said at last. "Now that he's stable, let's talk. Javelin, you were asking questions..."

Javelin nodded. "In order of appearance: where are we? How did you get here? How did you get these Nomes to work for you? What the hell is _that_ thing? And who's _that?"_

Elphaba took a deep breath. "It's a long story. Summed up, we're a guerrilla movement again. Basalt here is committing an act of rebellion against the Nome King, and let me out of my cell; the Nomes down here are taking orders from him. This," she indicated the mechanical frame that was being assembled behind her, "Is our secret weapon. Well, one of them. And this is-"

"Oscar Zoroaster Phadrig Isaac Norman Henkel Emmannuel Ambroise Diggs," squeaked Diggs, a rictus grin of terror frozen on his face. "Pleased to meet you."

"Pleased to meet you too," Javelin replied, though he sounded anything but. It could have been her imagination, but Elphaba swore a look of faint recognition crossed his face; she made a mental note to keep an eye on the two of them, just in case the penny twigged and Javelin tried to stab the former Wizard to death with his antlers.

Meanwhile, Javelin went about explaining what had happened after he'd managed to escape the Nome ambush; occasionally, Brollan would chime in with the details of how he'd ended up merging himself with at least five dead bodies, with Basalt rounding out the whole story by explaining how he'd met the two wandering survivors and how all three of them had found Rasp's corpse. By the time this whole dreary story had come to a close, Elphaba was torn between relief and the desire to strangle Brollan.

"What in the name of sanity were you _thinking?"_ she demanded wearily. "There's a reason why I kept that notebook to myself, you know."

"I know, I know, I know-"

"You do _now!_ What made you think that casting a healing spell on a corpse would have made the slightest bit of difference? And I'm not even getting into the fact that you didn't even know how to properly pronounce the words of the spell!" She took a deep breath. "Okay," she said wearily, "I understand what you were thinking; you were desperate and you thought you'd found the perfect way of solving the problem- you're not the first person to make this mistake. It's stupid, it's reckless, but it's understandable, so let's just try to repair as much of the damage as we can."

"How? I thought you said that your magic didn't work down here."

"_I know!"_ Elphaba burst out. "Can we just stick to _one problem at a time?"_ She took another deep breath. "Just tell me: have you had any difficulty breathing, numbness in your extremities, fainting spells- anything along those lines?"

"I.. I did feel a bit woozy in the first few minutes after I finished merging, but after that, I was fine. The main problem I've had is just getting all the different arms and legs to work properly."

"Well then, you're in luck: you've managed to merge yourself pretty seamlessly with the corpses: their hearts, lungs and circulatory systems are all intact inside you, and keeping a regular blood flow by the looks of things. The question is, how long will it last?"

"What do you mean?"

"Brollan, the bodies you were melded to were _dead_; they might have been pretty fresh when they connected to you, but they were still beginning to decompose. That's just one of the problems you might be facing: we've got to check your digestive tract, your liver, your kidneys, your skeleton... we've also got to examine how your immune system's dealing with the problem- for all we know, you might die from rejection syndrome in the next few days."

Under his hood, the Gilikin's distorted face furrowed heavily. "So, it's as I thought," he said softly. "I'm already dead."

"I didn't say that; it's just that your body is in a dangerous position. If we can get access to magic-"

"If," Brollan echoed dully. "_If._ You can't access your magic, Glinda's been enchanted to sleep, and the Nome King wouldn't help me if he knew I was down here." An awkward smile loomed from the darkness under the hood. "It's my own fault, though," he said sadly. "Play with matches and you'll get burned, Moleburr used to say."

"Brollan, I-"

"You don't need to say anything. It's... it's actually much better this way. I mean, I don't have to worry about dying when I already know I'm going to die, right? At least that way, if you need a meat shield in a crisis, I'm your man... or whatever I am."

"No! You do not- you-" Elphaba blinked furiously, and tried to collect her thoughts; she'd never been so disarmed by another human being's change in behaviour since she'd last met Nessarose, and once again it had almost completely taken her off guard. "Brollan," she said at last, "You do not need to throw your life away at this point-"

"What life? Even if we do somehow manage to get out of this alive, I'll still be a monster-"

"No, no, _no!_ I've known at least two other people who've been permanently transformed by magic and they went on to lead relatively normal lives. There is no need to throw your life away at this point!"

"Aren't we all throwing our lives away by rebelling, though?"

Elphaba put her head in her hands and made a sound roughly comparable to an exploding engine jacket.

And then, just when she was beginning to think that the level of sanity in the room had reached an all-time low, Woolwax arrived.

According to the workers, retrieving him had taken a great deal of effort- partly because of the difficulty involved in getting the Munchkin out of his cell without anyone noticing, but mostly because Woolwax had spent every last leg of the journey trying to headbutt his rescuers to death. All things considered, he made a very impressive entrance, still dressed in his straightjacket and manacles as he was; he'd even managed to chew through his gag at some point, so he was also howling expletives at the top of his voice.

Once they'd managed to calm him down, (which took a very small dose of sedative from the bundle of medical supplies, and the efforts of both Brollan _and_ Javelin to keep him restrained until he was mellow enough to hold a rational conversation) they once again went about explaining the grisly details: how they'd ended up here, what they were doing, and virtually every other pertinent detail except for the fact that Diggs was actually Elphaba's father and had once been the Wizard.

It took some time: quite apart from the fact that so much had occurred, Woolwax was not exactly in a very placid mood even after a dose of morphine; since his time in captivity had been spent bolted to the wall with a catheter in place of bathroom facilities, a few hours of this treatment had driven him to the very brink of insanity. As such, he insisted on stretching his legs immediately; thankfully, the workers had managed to expand the room by a good thirty feet, allowing Woolwax to continue the conversation at a brisk jog.

In all the noise and chaos, it took quite a while for anyone to notice that Rasp's condition had finally changed; in fact, it wasn't until the first wheeze of "Elphaba!" rang out across the room that anyone realised that the Governor had regained consciousness.

"Are you alright?" Elphaba asked.

By way of answering, Rasp sat up, and let out a shriek of pain, almost immediately collapsing back into the bedsheets. "Oh dear gods," he groaned. "Ow, ow, ow, ooooooowwwww..."

"What hurts?"

"Everything!"

"Rasp, I'm going to need specifics: is it internal pain or external pain?"

"External. I feel as though I'm - ouch – covered in bruises."

"You _are. _On the upside, it doesn't seem like any of the bones have regrown too poorly. Just hang on a minute; I've got some morphine here-"

Rasp shot bolt-upright with another agonized yowl. "Not just yet," he said urgently. "You've got the crystal ball, right?"

"Well I do _now,_ but how did you know that?"

"It's not important; you've got to look in the palace's southern cellars! You need to see what's going on down there!"

* * *

The plan was relatively simple.

Now that the gate was unlocked and Tik-Tok was active again, he, Jack and Bilina would go about building their escape vehicle; Dorothy- being the stealthiest of the group- would creep downstairs and steal the Powder of Life.

The first half was easy enough: if Jack was any evidence, the vehicle didn't need to be too complicated to work; all it needed was a head, a body large enough to carry all four of them, and a set of wings large enough to carry its weight. And with so much junk lying around in the attic, there was no shortage of materials to use: animal heads on the walls, furniture stacked in massive heaps, even length of sturdy rope left heaped in the corners.

Part two, on the other hand...

Dorothy shuddered, and tried not to breathe too loud as she crept slowly across the ballroom floor towards Mombi's bedchamber.

This, needless to say, was about the most dangerous thing she'd ever done in her entire life. Not only was the Powder of Life kept with one of the heads, opening the cabinet would require the key, which was kept tied to Mombi's wrist. Now, if Mombi was actually awake, the plan was over, and Dorothy would probably have her neck on the chopping block earlier than expected; if not, Dorothy would have to go about getting the key without waking her up. Yes, this plan was _insanely _risky, but this was the only way that they could reach the Nome King's Mountain, and she was the only one out of the entire group who could walk in and retrieve the Powder without falling apart, shutting down, or just making too much noise.

And she could only hope that nobody had heard her footsteps in the last few minutes, because now the doors of Mombi's bedchamber swung gently open before her. Taking a deep breath, she stepped inside, her footfalls instantly muffled by the carpet.

Thanks to the overhead skylight, Dorothy could clearly see that- thank goodness- the massive bed was occupied, and beneath the covers, someone was snoring very loudly. It was hard to tell if it was Mombi or not at first, but as she crept closer, she clearly recognized the long fingers and gold-painted nails. More importantly, she recognized the key, still tied to the left wrist, which was splayed out across the bed.

_Here goes everything,_ Dorothy thought. _It's one step closer to the Scarecrow,_ she reassured herself; _one step closer to the Scarecrow, one step closer to the Scarecrow, one step closer to the Scarecrow, one step closer to the Scarecrow..._

Creeping forward, she approached the bed as slowly and carefully as she could; it took almost a minute. Every second of that minute was spent praying that Mombi wouldn't turn over, because there'd be no way of getting the key out from under the covers without waking her up.

Thankfully, the witch's unladylike snoring managed to muffle the occasional hiss of Dorothy's shoes across the carpet. If nothing else, it let her breathe a little easier until she was closer to the bed.

After a minute of tiptoeing, the bed was within arm's reach. From here, she could clearly see that the ribbon that the key was tied to was bound tightly around Mombi's wrist, which meant that just sliding it off was impossible; she'd have to undo the knot.

So, holding her breath and leaning over-so gently against the bed, Dorothy reached out towards the sleeping witch's left hand...

... absently reflected on just how guttural those snores sounded...

... grasped the ends of the ribbon with both hands, doing her best not to touch Mombi's skin...

... and pulled.

The knot easily slid apart, and Dorothy began gently unravelling the ribbon, drawing it apart until it lay loosely on the bed.

And then, with a loud hiss, Mombi turned over.

Dorothy instinctively flung herself out of sight; for five seconds, she lay just under the bed, hoping that Mombi hadn't woken up and not daring to move a muscle until she was sure that the witch was still asleep. Eventually, the snoring returned, and Dorothy tentatively lifted herself back up to the bed. Immediately, she realised why those horrible snores had sounded so guttural and watery: Mombi slept headless.

Forcing her eyes away from the revolting sight of the tattered neck stump, she reached out, grabbed the key, and scurried away as quietly as possible, trying to steady her thundering heartbeat. And worse still, she knew it wasn't going to slow anytime soon, because she headed for the hall of heads next, and if it had looked unnerving in the daylight, at night it'd look downright horrifying.

But she forced herself to carry on through the room: _it's one step closer to the Scarecrow,_ she told herself silently; _one step closer to the Scarecrow, one step closer to the Scarecrow, once step closer to the Scarecrow..._

The hallway, unfortunately, was _not_ carpeted, making Dorothy's process through the chamber even slower. And though she tried to keep her eyes focussed on the distant window of cabinet #31, she couldn't stop herself from glancing around at the sleeping heads in their cabinets, and picturing herself among them.

Somehow, she made it to the end of the hall. On tiptoes, she slipped the key into the lock, and turned (the click of the lock sounding unnaturally loud in the silent hallway); slowly, the mirrored window swung aside, and Dorothy almost yelped in shock as the sleeping face of Mombi's original head lurched out at her like a jack-in-the-box; it was only a trick of the light, given that the head hadn't actually moved, but that didn't stop it from frightening the life out of Dorothy. The face wasn't exactly a pretty sight either: it was alarmingly gaunt, almost skull-like to Dorothy's eyes, with long snakelike coils of hair spilling over its sharp features.

The inside of the cabinet was decidedly messy, with the head almost pushed aside to make room for all the junk; most of it consisted bottles of perfume and cosmetics- except for the can labelled "POWDER OF LIFE."

_Perfect._

Heart leaping, Dorothy reached out to grab it.

And then her luck failed her: as her arm snaked out towards the can, she brushed past a tiny bottle of perfume, which clattered loudly to the floor.

Mombi's eyes snapped open.

For a split second, the head stared out at her in confusion; for a split second, Dorothy stared back, paralysed with fear. Then the head bellowed, "DOROTHY GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAALE!"

The scream galvanized Dorothy into action: her hand shot out at blinding speed towards the Powder of Life, her fingers barely missing the head's snapping teeth; as soon as her fingers tightened around the can, she drew her hand back and slammed the cabinet shut. But behind the closed door, the head continued to scream; worse still, the other heads were awake now and every single of them was screaming in unison with their mistress.

And just fifty feet away, Mombi's body was clambering out of bed and slowly making its way towards the hall.

Pausing only to lock the cabinet behind her and take the key from the lock, Dorothy ran for her life, ducking under the headless body's flailing arms and hurrying away as fast as her legs could carry her. Hopefully, the locked cabinet would delay Mombi, at least for as long as it took to escape the palace.

Not even bothering with stealth this time around, Dorothy sprinted wildly across the bathroom towards the secret door, Mombi's screams ringing in her ears...

... Only to find herself facing another bank of mirrors; at some point during the last few minutes, the door must have swung shut. Trying furiously to stop herself from panicking, she fumbled for the latch, only to find it was gone: either she'd gotten herself completely lost among the wildly-clashing reflections and chosen the wrong bank of mirrors, or the secret door was enchanted to shuffle itself among the mirrors.

Either way, there was no way in _hell_ she'd find the right mirror before Mombi found her head and caught up with her.

And then, just as Dorothy was cursing herself for not marking the door with a piece of string, something caught her eye, and she turned to face it- wondering if Mombi had somehow caught up with her sooner than expected. Instead, she found herself staring at a mirror on the opposite wall. There, just behind the glass, a shimmering indistinct figure stood; Dorothy could just about discern the vague shape of a long dress among the trails of mist that composed it, but other than that, the thing was almost completely featureless. But whatever was, ghost or reflection, it appeared to be beckoning Dorothy towards it.

_Never turn down a helping hand,_ she thought desperately. _One step closer to the Scarecrow!_

And with that, she ran towards the mirror. By the time she'd arrived, the ghost had already faded away, but it didn't matter- Dorothy had already found the latch. Silently thanking whatever guardian angel had gotten her out of this nightmare, she opened the door and all but flung herself up the stairs towards the attic.

_One step closer to the Scarecrow._

* * *

Once she was certain that Rasp wasn't in any immediate danger, Elphaba had given him a walking stick made of leftover iron, a hasty tutorial on the plan so far, and a warning not to try and move too quickly- before finally taking his advice.

As she'd gone about readying the crystal ball, she'd asked what was so important about the southern cellars and what was being assembled down there, but Rasp had gotten uncharacteristically tight-lipped; the most he'd been willing to say was that he _might_ have heard a couple of passing Nome guards talking about it. Basalt, however, knew little about that particular wing of the cellars; it was reserved for only the most elite of the King's servants, and off-limits to anyone outside those ranks except for the King. And since Basalt and his spies would have been caught easily if they'd tried to sneak in, scrying was the only safe and reliable way to get a decent look at was happening.

Thankfully, the nullifying effect on Elphaba's magic didn't extend to the crystal ball, and this time, attempting to view the caverns beneath the plateau didn't send the thing into spasms of static. _Makes sense, I suppose,_ Elphaba thought;_ now that we're underground, we're past whatever interference was keeping me from watching this place before. _With Basalt providing directions, she found the cellars quite easily; all it took was a thousand feet to the left of the room and a descent of about twenty-seven stories, and suddenly the endless bedrock was replaced by walls of gleaming white marble.

For a cellar, this had to be one of the largest rooms that Elphaba had ever seen in her entire life: it could have comfortably accommodated the towers of the Wizard's palace and still had room to squeeze in a few dozen mansion-sized houses. Colossal arches and buttresses of white marble crowded the domed ceiling, and sturdy pillars of the same material dotted the length and breadth of the room itself; on every stretch of wall, however, there were large rectangular windows exposed to the bedrock outside the palace walls- entry points for Nome guards, probably.

But as astonishing as the architecture might have been, it was the contents of the room that drew the eye: from one end of the room to the other- on elegant little tables, on decorative pedestals, on shelves, hanging from the wall, sitting on the floor- the room was filled with ornaments. Vases, urns, goblets, statuettes, busts, framed pictures, hand-painted bowls and dishes, wooden clocks, golden candlesticks, enormous seashells, ornate mirrors, filigreed lamps- there was simply too much of it to count or even guess at its value. One thing was for certain: more than half of this collection had been taken from Ozian territories; Elphaba recognized a good many of them as museum pieces from the Emerald City Museum of Cultural Brilliance, or exhibitions at the Gallery of Oz.

And at the centre of this grisly treasure trove, almost lost among the bric-a-brac, stood the Nome King himself, eyes closed and arms raised to cast a spell- a very powerful one, if she could feel it tingling down her spine even at this distance. Elphaba felt her magic flex as it briefly regained a morsel of its old strength; so this was what had been distracting the King! As she watched, the lines of a mystical circle were slowly drawn across the room in lines of ethereal energies, invisible to the naked eye and almost intangible, but undeniably power: before her eyes, the room itself was being converted into the centrepiece of one gigantic magical ritual.

Once the casting was complete, the King stood back, and turned to the Nomes standing by the wall; he singled out the tallest of them, a hunched looking Nome with a decidedly wolfish smile. **"How long has it been?"** he asked softly.

"Well past six hours, Your Majesty."

"**Mombi should have captured her by now. Something tells me that our supposed ally may have decided against fulfilling her end of the bargain... but the girl's lifesigns haven't stopped- I can tell that much..."** He thought for a moment. **"I will give her until morning. If the delivery hasn't been made by then, I want that idiot witch arrested and all three components of the ritual brought to me. Until then, keep a close on the City."**

_And there's another reason why his attention's been drifting, _Elphaba thought.

"It will be done, Your Majesty."

"**Good."** The King turned to cluster of servants nearby. **"In the meantime, I want you four to ensure that his Majesty the Scarecrow is fully prepared for his part in the ritual,"** he ordered. **"You know the details well enough- get to it."**

"Should we sedate and restrain him, Your Majesty?"

"**What would be the point? In a few hours time, he won't have a body to restrain- or a consciousness to sedate, for that matter."**

Elphaba didn't wait to hear what was said next; all but tossing the ball aside, she stood up and yelled, "Basalt, we need to get to Fiyero's cell!"

"Miss Elphaba, why-"

"No time for questions, damn it! It's just next-door, and we need to get in there and rescue Fiyero _NOW!"_

Basalt droned an order to two of the nearest workers, who marched over to the opposite wall and began burrowing through it. Within seconds, they'd dug a reasonably-sized tunnel in the rock; as soon as the passage was wide enough to walk through, Elphaba ran through it. "Fiyero," she called, "You need to walk this way _now!"_

There was no reply.

The cell was empty.

For thirty terrible seconds, Elphaba stood deathly still in the centre of the empty prison cell, breathing heavily, her fists clenched in rage; for half a minute, she wasn't in the Nome territories anymore- she was back in Kiamo Ko, the Grimmerie lying abandoned on the floor in front of her, her grief-stricken screams echoing throughout the castle and her rage-fuelled magic blasting the land around it.

Then, she was back in the palace and in motion again, hurrying back down the passageway into Digg's cell. "They took him!" she snarled. "They must have taken him hours ago!"

She was immediately surrounded by every single Ozian member of the group, all of them asking questions: "Why was he taken?" "Where was he taken?" "Isn't he just being used as bait?" and worst of all, "Why are they doing this to him?"

"_I don't know!"_ Elphaba screeched. "All I know is that he's going to be used in a ritual, and it's going to kill him!" She took a deep breath. "I need to talk to the bastard," she said quietly.

"What?"

"I need to talk to the Nome King! I need to know what he's up to, and I am officially out of ideas on how to find out!"

There was a long and awkward silence.

"I know," Elphaba said softly. "I know. You don't need to tell me: if I start running my mouth, he'll know that I've been spying on him, and he'll know that I've got Nome supporters, and the whole house of cards will come crashing down." She took several deep breaths. "Just give me a minute," she sighed, massaging her temples. "Give a minute... I need to think of what to say."

* * *

Ten minutes later, Elphaba was back in her own bedchamber, waiting for the Nome King to arrive; before asking one of the guards to summon him, she'd done her best to think up a suitable excuse for knowing everything she couldn't have possibly known about, and she'd rehearsed her lines as best as she could.

And in all likelihood, it might not be enough.

She'd never been good at controlling her temper- after all, hadn't her great rebellion started with one angry outburst? Here, though, it'd probably get everyone remotely involved in her current rebellion killed: one slip of the tongue, one flaw in the story, and everyone hiding downstairs in Digg's cell- Nome and refugee alike- would be executed, or worse. So, she tried to keep herself calm and collected as possible, even as the familiar sound of the King's approach filled the air, and the smiling face appeared in the wall.

"**Can I help you?"**

"Why do you still have Fiyero?" she asked.

"**I'm sorry?"**

"_Why do you still have Fiyero?_ If you'd wanted to use him as bait to lure me in, you'd have gotten rid of him the moment I arrived, and I wasn't talking to an illusion back in that prison cell."

"**Presumptuous of you, Elphaba; how do you know that I haven't discarded him already?"**

"I'm not stupid, Your Majesty: I can recognize the sound Nomes make when they move through the rock; I know exactly where Fiyero's imprisoned; and I also know he wouldn't allow himself to be manhandled without struggling. And I know you wouldn't bother just teleporting him away- you've got better things to do?"

The King's face twitched with the effort of trying not to smile. **"Is that the only reason you wanted to speak with me?"**

"Of course not: there are too many missing pieces in this plan of yours, and too many things that don't add up; I've already told you that there's no sense in leaving Mombi around in the Emerald City if you only needed her to point me in the right direction; then there's that massive surge of magic that went out across Oz last night- I'm pretty sure that only someone with the Ruby Slippers could have produced that kind of shockwave. And what about the surges of magic I've been feeling in the last few minutes? This is all part of your plan, isn't it?"

"**Assuming it was, are you expecting me to just explain every single detail of this plan to you free of charge?"**

"I already have a pretty good idea of what you're doing," Elphaba shot back. "Now that I've refused to translate and cast this Grimmerie spell for you, you aren't going to wait for Glinda to do so either- you've got another substitute ready for the task."

One cliff-like eyebrow rose. **"Do I, now? Go on."**

"I don't know if this understudy of yours can translate the Grimmerie, but I'm betting that's not the point. Those surges of magic I've been feeling in the last few minutes are all part of a ritual- and don't try to lie to me, because I've seen enough magic rituals to recognize the distinctive patterns of energy by _touch! _This latest substitute is going to use this ritual to transform you into a human being, and Fiyero is going to be used to fuel the magic. Now, I don't know why- maybe you need someone who's been exposed to the magic of the Grimmerie, maybe you need something immortal enough to withstand the process- and I don't care. Fiyero is _off limits._ Simple as that."

"**Your hypothesis is intriguing, Elphaba, but then again, so are the implications: are you offering to perform the spell in return for his life?"**

"I'm offering nothing until I know what you're up to."

The King laughed. **"You surprise me once again, Elphaba. I'm going to have to keep a very close watch on you from now on. But to answer your question, your theory was close to the truth- close, but not entirely accurate. You were right about the ritual: Fiyero is going to be one its components, but not for the reasons you think." **His smile grew. **"While I was enhancing the power of the Ruby Slippers, researching new methods of harnessing their magical strength, I discovered a very unique thaumaturgic rite: apart from drawing out the lines and sigils, it's very simple. All it needs is for four or five unlucky contenders, all bound by ties of friendship, to willingly sacrifice themselves to it; it converts their souls into energy- energy that will fuel my transformation into a human."**

"Why Fiyero?"

"**The answer lies in the substitute: your lover is also the bait that will draw this little understudy in."**

"_But who's the understudy?"_ Elphaba yelled, frustration briefly rearing its head.

"**Not a witch, that much is certain. But in all seriousness, I told you that the souls must be bound by friendship- can you name two other people that still consider the Scarecrow a friend?"**

Elphaba's mind raced.

"Oh _gods,"_ she said at last. "Boq! The Lion!"

"**Precisely. Now you know why I made sure they were petrified, not killed."**

"But you said that there had to be at least four. Who else do the three know who-" She stopped dead in mid-sentence; one of the last pieces of the puzzle had slotted into place. "It can't be," she said. "I mean, the power I felt last night was beyond belief, but it couldn't have been enough to reach across worlds-"

"**I've already told you that the power of the Ruby Slippers is infinite in scope."**

"Are you joking?"

"**Not even remotely."**

"_Dorothy Gale is my substitute?"_

The King laughed and applauded thunderously, sending tiny chunks of gravel flying from his hands. **"Well done, Elphaba! Well done indeed!"**

"_Why_," Elphaba demanded, "_Why_ in the name of everything sane and healthy would you use Dorothy Gale as the centrepiece of this ritual?"

"**The centrepiece of the ritual needs to be human; after all, it's their energy that shall form the final direction of my metamorphosis. And a traveller from another world carries with it the energy of dimensions- the very basis of your power, I might add, Child of Two Worlds- and it's a power that will add all the more strength to the ritual."**

"But if that's the case, you could have used _anyone _from the other world! You could have used the Wizard!"

"**I hardly think his Ozness would work well as a centrepiece; he doesn't exactly form friendships very easily or maintain them for very long, if you know what I mean. Dorothy Gale, on the other hand, a frightened child with nobody to turn to but those she met on the road... even after a year, the bonds of friendship haven't faded yet." **The King's smile widened horribly. **"She arrived back in Oz just a few hours ago; guided by the ruins of the Yellow Brick Road, she made her way to the Emerald City; once Mombi captures her, she'll be brought here along with the Lion and the Tin Man... and then the ritual shall commence."**

"Oh really? How are you supposed to get a child to willingly sacrifice herself?"

"**I'm sure that can wait until she arrives. But in the meantime,"** he continued, his tone solemn and unsmiling,** "you have a choice to make, as I'm sure you're aware of. I hate to threaten you, but I'm obliged to make your decisions clear- and I hope you'll forgive me for it."**

Elphaba scoffed bitterly. "So you _are_ going to punish me for saying no after all."

"**I'm not punishing anyone, Elphaba; I don't **_**want**_** to punish anyone except the War Council. I'm merely taking what steps I have to take. You have a choice; you have a chance to be happy, to live the life you always dreamed of living. And best of all, by taking that chance, you save the lives of your beloved Fiyero, the Tin Man, the Lion, and one innocent child. Is that so great a price to pay?"**

Once again, she remembered that beautiful face that had stared back at her from the mirror, the happy life that she'd seen play out in the memory sphere; she remembered being hugged and cradled by her parents, and she remembered all the triumphs that green skin had denied her. But then her memory took her in a different direction: she saw the twisted bodies of Lord Eldrect and his household, Curter burning alive in midair, the Wizard's scarred face and tortured expression... and finally the bellow of frustration and righteous anger that the Nome King had let slip in their last conversation. What would a man so bitter and so vengeful do with power to control reality? He wouldn't stop at killing the War Council, most likely.

"I'm not-"

"**You remember the horror that you felt when you saw the Emerald City ruined before your eyes, with Chistery and all his brothers petrified? Dorothy Gale feels that same horror- and why wouldn't she? The land she loved so much has become a nightmare; as far as she knows, two of her friends are dead, and the one she cares about the most- the one I use as bait to draw her in- is being held captive by monsters. Don't you want to spare her the pain of carrying on? Don't you see anything of yourself in her, or do you still hate her for the role she played a year ago?"**

Elphaba's jaw clenched. She remembered the last time she'd seen Dorothy, a whimpering figure cowering in a corner of the room, sobbing helplessly into the fur of the dog she cradled in her arms. On that night, the hatred of the girl had finally faded away: all she'd felt that night was the same mixture of pity and disgust she'd so often felt for Boq; the girl wasn't a murderer or even a great supporter of the Wizard- she was just a pawn, a desperate child being pushed around a chessboard with no way of resisting. And it was happening all over again.

"**And what about those you love? What about Fiyero? Don't you want to see him again, alive and happy? Don't you want to hold him in your arms and kiss him... or has your self-loathing consumed even that simple desire?" **He sighed. **"Glinda would have said yes. Why wouldn't you?"**

For a moment, Elphaba thought she might lose her temper; she felt the rage building up inside her, an inferno just waiting to be released, bubbling just underneath her skin. The Nome King wasn't just threatening the life of Fiyero, but gloating- _gloating!-_ over the fact that he'd managed to bully Glinda into accepting his offer and doing his bidding, that he'd _broken_ her spirit and left her to torture herself for as long as she worked. She remembered the signs of obsession in Glinda's workspace, cold plates of uneaten food, the weight loss, the horror stories that Basalt had told her, the long nights that her friend had spent trying to stop herself from going insane... and in that instant, she felt her teeth grinding together, her fists clenched tight enough for her fingernails to cut deep into her palms... And then, she took a deep breath, and every last drop of anger flowed out of her: this wasn't a situation warranting any kind of anger that Elphaba had felt before. This was beyond berserk; this was beyond unstoppable fury; this was even beyond incandescent, magic-hurling, city-destroying all-consuming rage. This was the kind of anger that ran cold, the kind of wrath that could only be expressed in carefully-measured tones, impeccable manners, and a cutthroat razor being held against another human being's eyeball.

"I'll tell you this much, Your Highness," she said calmly. "You _will _become human; your transformation will be a complete success; you'll have all the power you'll ever want in your grasp." She waited for the surprised smile to spread across the King's face. "And then you're going to die," she continued. "You're going to die and you'll do so choking on what passes for your blood, screaming your final agonies as I look on."

"**Really?" **said the King, his face alight with amusement. **"Is that a threat, or is it a promise?"**

"Neither," said Elphaba. "It's a _prophecy."_

The King blinked.

"You know how accurate my predictions are," she added, and smiled.

The Nome King's face twitched and Elphaba swore she noticed a flicker of alarm on the smiling features. Then he shrugged. **"Very well,"** he said. **"As I've said before, you can always change your mind... just be quick about if you want to see Fiyero again."**

With that, he vanished.

Elphaba waited until the rumbling of his passage was out of earshot, and then called for Basalt.

"I can't afford to head back downstairs," she hissed. "There'll probably be a whole troop of spies watching me in a minute or two. Just tell Diggs and the others that they need to pick up the pace: we're going to need that machine ready by tomorrow morning."

"But what about the plan of attack, Miss Elphaba; the machine itself will not be enough on its own."

She thought for a moment. "Give me a couple of hours, then send up one of your workers; I'll send him back with a plan. Now go, _go!"_

* * *

Hundreds of miles away, one of the strangest creatures in the world soared out across the ruins of Oz: its body, if you could call it that, was made of two sofas lashed together; its four enormous wings were little more than palm ferns; it's tail was an old broom; it's head was a hunting trophy- the well-preserved head of a moose-like gump, antlers and all. It grumbled to itself as it flew, asking plaintively what had happened to the rest of its original body.

In the cramped seating on the gump's back, squeezed in between Tik-Tok's cumbersome bulk and Jack Pumpkinhead's spindly body, Dorothy Gale lay in an exhausted heap.

_It won't be long now,_ she thought wearily. _One step closer to the Scarecrow; one step closer to the Scarecrow; one step closer to the Scarecrow..._

* * *

A/N: We're on the home stretch, ladies and gents! I hope you enjoyed this chapter- the next will be here soon...


	31. Let The Games Begin

A/N: The latest chapter, ladies and gentlemen, submitted for your approval; we're on the last few chapters of this story, and we've just about reached the stage where _Wicked _and _Return to Oz_ collide head-on. I hope you enjoy this latest section of the story just as much as I enjoyed writing it, and I apologise if it's a bit on the talkative side; the serious action is still a chapter or so away.

Before we begin, I'd like to thank Wile E. Coyote for commenting; at the risk of giving too much away, though, Boq and the Lion won't be among the cargo aboard Mombi's chariot- for reasons you'll discover.

So, without further ado- a chapter of rising tensions, deceit, manipulation and unexpected doubts and sympathies- read, review and enjoy!

Disclaimer: Wicked, Return to Oz and the Oz universe doesn't belong to me, as the spinning ghost of L Frank Baum continually informs me.

* * *

Two hours later, the flurry of construction work that Diggs' cell had become was briefly interrupted by Basalt's messenger returning with Elphaba's newly-formulated plan. Tearing their eyes away from the vast metal skeleton that had taken shape in the centre of the room, the four non-Nome members of the construction team clustered around Basalt; after a few minutes of leafing through the papers, he read the plan aloud:

The plan, as it happened, was extraordinarily risky ("No surprises there," said Rasp grimly) but probably the only course available to any of them ("So what else is new?"). On the upside, now that they knew what the Nome King was planning, they had a chance of stopping it: magic rituals were difficult to disrupt, but they weren't entirely foolproof; loopholes existed in almost every one, most of them so tiny as to be almost unnoticeable, but capable of bringing the whole ritual crashing to a halt. In this case, because the King had intended the ritual components to be Dorothy and her friends, if one of them was missing, the ritual couldn't be completed; so, as soon as the ritual was ready to begin, the first contender ("hopefully the Scarecrow," Elphaba had written for some reason) would be whisked away before they could be sacrificed.

As always, timing was paramount: because the plan depended on Elphaba being able to manage a teleportation spell, she'd have to wait until the King had his attention focussed entirely on the ritual before casting; in the event that the attempt failed, Basalt would have to be ready to grab the contender and run- hopefully acting quickly enough to avoid being ordered to halt. With the ritual a failure, the Nome King's self-control would begin to collapse once again, allowing Elphaba and Diggs to launch a full-scale attack on him with the War Engine (which would hopefully be finished by then).

Rasp gently pinched the bridge of his nose, and leaned heavily on his walking stick. "I don't think I can count just how many ways this plan can go wrong," he sighed. "I mean, are we anywhere _near_ finishing this damn thing?"

"We're getting there," said Diggs vaguely. He was more or less right in this regard: the skeleton of the War Engine was complete by now, as were quite a few of its inner mechanisms; so far, it still lacked a boiler, armour-plating and treads, the drill head hadn't been fastened to the front of the monstrosity just yet, and the failed gun turrets were due to be replaced by a guardrail of rocket launchers for Wolwax to operate. All the same, there was no denying that the Nome workers had managed to do in hours what would have taken days, if not months. "We'll be ready," he continued. "But you're right; we're taking a lot of chances with this plan."

"It may be the only way of disrupting the King's power, sirs," Basalt pointed out.

"I know that. But it's not going to make this any easier on my nerves. I mean, what happens if the Nome King can continue the ritual without the Scarecrow? What if he finds a replacement? I mean, surely Dorothy would have made other friends while she was in Oz- God only knows there were enough people lining up to kiss her hand on her second visit to the Emerald City."

"_Not_ exactly the same thing as friendship," said Rasp absently; he'd noticed the suspicious glare that Javelin was now directing at Diggs. "Besides, most of those people are dead."

"Thanks for reminding me. But what about Glinda? Surely she could be used as a replacement-"

Basalt shook his head. "Glinda herself told me that the two of them only met each other twice; their relationship did not stray beyond the level of acquaintances."

"Besides," Woolwax added loudly, "The stony bastard knows that if he even thinks of touching her, he'll be rubble and dust by the time I'm done with him."

"Nice to know your fanaticism is still intact."

"Thanks. But there's another thing; how do you know this damn thing is even going to move when it's finished? And what's _this?"_ He pointed to a small row of grilled boxes dangling from the half-finished conning tower.

Diggs' face lit up. "That's something I rigged up to add... well, a little bit of psychological warfare to this attack. I mean, we're meant to be annoying the King until he can't even control his magic properly, so I had some of the workers manufacture and build one of my prototype voice-amplifying systems."

"I did wonder why you asked for more workers," said Basalt.

"Relax; it only took about an hour and a half to assemble."

Woolwax barely managed to disguise a snort of laughter. "You never heard of a megaphone?" he grunted. "With the way these Nomes work, I'd say it'd take exactly _two seconds_ to build. Besides, if you wanted someone to make a lot of noise, you should have just asked me."

"No offence, Mr Woolwax, but I think my prototype is louder by far." He hobbled over to the machine and allowed one of the workers to gingerly lift him all the way to the top of the top; there, he fumbled with the controls for a moment or two, before holding the microphone aloft and bellowing into it "FEEEEEEEEAAAAAAARRRRRRRRR MEEEEEEEEEE_EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!_" in a voice amplified to a volume that nearly shredded their eardrums to atoms.

There was a long and awkward pause as the echoes died away.

"Let's hope nobody else heard that," said Rasp, as Basalt gently helped him to his feet.

"What?"

"I said, _"let's hope nobody else heard that,"_ Woolwax."

"It may not be the case, Governor Rasp," Basalt intoned. "It is doubtful that we would have made enough noise to penetrate the bedrock for more than ten feet."

"Does it matter who heard what?" Brollan slurred, wiping blood from all six of his ears. "We're probably never going to be hearing anything again."

"What?"

"Give it a minute or two. I ended up with my own share of temporary deafness when I was first testing this thing out for public use, way back when..." Diggs hesitated. "Well, it doesn't matter now," he said at last, as the worker began lowering him back to the floor. "It's a long story, and I'm pretty sure you're not interested."

"Oh, do go on, your Ozness," said Javelin coldly.

Except for the hammering in the background, there was silence, as all heads turned in the Gazelle's direction. Then, Diggs - who now looked as though every last drop of blood had been drained from his face - mumbled, "What are you talking about?"

"You know damn well what I'm talking about. I saw your face on the day you left Oz, on one of the few days an Animal could walk the streets of the Emerald City without getting arrested! You might have lost a few stone and gained a few scars, but there's no forgetting your face... or the voice you just used. Do you think we wouldn't recognize the voice of the giant face?"

Recognizing the fury in Javelin's voice, Rasp began hobbling unsteadily towards them. "Javelin," he soothed, "I'm pretty sure this is just a coinic-"

"Look at his face! _Look at him!_ You saw his picture in the newspapers- it's the Wizard!"

For a whole minute, the sound of hammering was drowned out by the argument that followed: Javelin was screaming accusations at Diggs, condemning him as the mastermind of pogroms against Animals; Brollan was pointing out all the reasons why the Wizard couldn't be here- calmly, at first, then louder and angrier, until any shred of civility between the two was forgotten; Woolwax was bellowing for order and trying (with Basalt's assistance) to stop the first two disputants from getting within arm's reach of one another; Rasp was mediating in a vain attempt to try and figure out if anyone could be persuaded to make sense. And throughout the cataclysmic squabble, Diggs, the supposed Wizard, remained silent and impassive as a statue; for all the reaction he showed to the argument raging in front of him, he could have been a million miles away.

It wasn't until all four arguing refugees were too exhausted to speak that he finally spoke: "He's right."

"What?"

"He's right," Diggs repeated, and this time, there was the faintest hint of fear in his voice. "I'm the Wizard. Well, it's fair to say that I _was;_ as you can see, times have changed."

"Evidently," said Rasp.

"You're _really _the Wizard?" Woolwax murmured, awestruck.

"I _was._ Once upon a time, I was the Wizard; now, I'm just Oscar Diggs."

Under the shadows of his hood, Brollan's many eyes could be seen blinking in amazement. "So Elphaba was right all along? You really were just... just..."

"Just a man? In a word, yes. No magic, no power, just a lot of machinery and lies. In fact, I only learned how to use magic a couple of hours ago- from Elphaba, believe it or not."

Javelin wasn't so easily placated. "Is that _all_ you have to say for yourself?" he demanded. "After all the deaths, the brainwashings, the torture- all that pain, and you've nothing to say for yourself but "I was the Wizard?" Do you know just how many of my friends and relatives _died_ because of you? Do you know that people were afraid to speak out against you because they _thought_ you had magical powers?" His left hoof clattered noisily against the ground in frustration. "And now we find you here, with no magic, and part of a machine that made everyone think that you were an all-powerful wizard, and you expect us to..." He stopped, having finally run out of breath.

Diggs sighed. "What do you want me to say?" he said quietly. "That I was a con-artist? A tyrant? A monster? I know all that by now. It took a year of the Nome King's tender ministrations for me to acknowledge it." He gestured vaguely at the scarring around his cheeks and neck with shaking, twisted hands. "If it's any comfort to you, I know what... what your people went through."

"And you think that somehow makes everything better?"

"Do you think that I've got enough pride left to think so?"

"Do you think I _care?_ I couldn't care less about what torture you were put through, or what deal you have with Elphaba, or even why you've suddenly had this miraculous change of heart- I want justice for the Animals you had brainwashed or imprisoned!"

And then, just as it looked as though Javelin was about to charge, there was a loud clang of metal on metal; Rasp had just struck the side of the half-finished War Engine with his walking stick. "This is not the time to start fighting," he said coldly, once he'd regained his balance.

"Oh, so you want to show fealty to the old bastard, is that it? Is that your line of reasoning, _Governor?_ Or are you going to spout some "if-you-kill-him-you'll-be-just-like-him" bullshit?"

"Javelin, calm down for a minute and _think: _if you kill him now, we lose the only person who knows how this monstrosity can be properly put together, or even how it's controlled; no Wizard, no War Engine; no War Engine, no attack; no attack, and if it comes to the worst, the Nome King gets control of reality. At this point, I'm too tired to go over what _might_ happen afterwards. And frankly, it's too early after my operation for me to start breaking up fights. So, all I'm asking is that you calm down and wait until we're either out of this debacle or dead before you start trying to take revenge."

"This isn't about revenge," said Javelin, but there was a defeated edge to his voice now. "This is about justice."

"Fine. Call it whatever you want- after all, there's no-one left alive to enforce the law, is there? Just wait until this is all over, and then you can do what you want with him if you have the stomach for murder."

There was a long silence, once again punctuated by the clamour of construction.

"As long as I'm still standing, I've got to ask..." Rasp turned unsteadily to face the Wizard. "Why the hell would Elphaba agree to work with _you_, of all people?" he asked bluntly.

In spite of himself, Diggs smiled. "Time heals all wounds, as they say, and seeing me as I was... well, you could say I inspired a bit of sympathy. Of course, the fact that I'd been making blueprints for the last few months helped."

"But those can't be the only reasons!"

"Of course not, but if I told you, Elphaba would probably rip my skin off and make laboratory aprons out of it. I'll be happy to tell you almost everything else- how I ended up here, what's been happening over the last twelve months, even what I was doing before I arrived in Oz. But that one other reason why Elphaba helped me is officially off limits- only _she_ can tell you that. Clear?"

"Crystal. I'll be happy to listen as well, so long as this story doesn't interfere with you building this machine."

"Understood. In that case, where shall we begin?"

* * *

It had been ten hours since Elphaba had written the plan, and since then, events had proceeded alarmingly placidly: she'd thought of anything that could improve the plan, she'd worried about everything that could possibly go wrong, and once she was absolutely certain there was nothing else she could possibly do, she'd slept. It seemed an utterly ridiculous thing to do under the circumstance, what with the fate of what little remained of Oz _and_ the fabric of reality itself hanging in the balance, but doing otherwise would have just looked suspicious to the King. So, trying not to admit to herself that she wasn't actually feeling tired, she'd gotten into bed, closed her eyes, and actually fallen asleep - much to her later amazement.

After a surprisingly restful slumber, she'd awoken to find breakfast waiting on the table, along with a note from Basalt containing the best possible news she could have received: the Nomes which had been circling her room for the past few hours had been called away on "urgent business" to the border of Nome territory, apparently to delay the approach of the War Council.

_Makes sense,_ she thought, as she chewed her way through the odd-looking cakes and slices on the breakfast tray. _After all, as far as he knows, I'm a _potential_ risk-_ _the War Council are a _confirmed _risk. All I've got to worry about now are little things, like the War Engine failing, or my attempt to stop the ritual failing..._

If nothing else, Elphaba was glad that she finally had her bag of supplies nearby again, hidden under her bed just in case the spies returned to watch the room again. After those torturously boring hours spent gazing into the memory sphere, having something else to do besides watch the memories of her other self play out was a relief beyond compare. It wasn't just the simple joy of having a book to read, but the fact that she now had the ideal means of keeping an eye on what was happening around the palace without having to endanger Basalt and his spies. And yes, quite a bit of what was happening around the palace consisted of Nomes doing incomprehensible things and the Nome King impatiently waiting for Mombi to respond to his messenger, but now, Elphaba had a guaranteed way of predicting when she'd next be able to use her powers.

Doubly thankfully, her attempts at locating Fiyero had been met with considerable success: at this very moment, he was sitting in a large, cavernous chamber in the uppermost halls of the palace, an area which Basalt had helpfully identified as the audience chamber. In any case, the room was surrounded on all sides, inside and out, by guards; there'd be no chance of having Basalt or any of the workers smuggle him out, so the original plan of teleporting Fiyero away just before the start of the ritual was still in place.

Equally unfortunately, she'd had time to study the lines of power that the King had drawn in the cellars, and found more than half of it almost impossible to decipher: she couldn't figure out exactly how the ritual was supposed to proceed, she didn't know what level of participation would be required from Dorothy and the others, she didn't even know if there was any other way of stopping it apart from teleporting Fiyero out of it. The only thing she'd learned was that the condition of "willing sacrifices" was much broader than she thought: the King could charm, bribe, threaten and torture- as long as the he didn't actually make the sacrifices himself, the ritual would still work... as far as she could tell.

In between worrying about the ritual and wondering how soon the War Engine was due to be ready, Elphaba found herself thinking of Glinda.

If everything went according to plan, Glinda would be rescued from the palace- that much was known and predicted; however, the one thing that Elphaba couldn't predict was how Glinda would react to seeing Elphaba alive. Almost certainly, there would be disbelief, and likely a great deal of anger and disillusionment... and probably a lot of justifiable hatred.

And then the friendship would fall to pieces in the light of the _massive_ betrayal Glinda had suffered.

In all likelihood, Glinda would never want to speak to her again.

Or see her again, for that matter.

She'd vanish into a refugee settlement in the north of Oz, Elphaba would take up residence in the ruins of Kiamo Ko, and they'd spend the rest of their grim, miserable lives there, hating one another and themselves for every single folly that led to-

Elphaba gave herself a shake. Thinking like this would be the death of her; she could only hope for the best... and hope that, in time, she could be forgiven.

* * *

The Grimmerie was gone from the desk.

A cursory sweep of the room revealed that it had not been concealed anywhere easily reachable- after all, why would anyone with good reason to hide the Grimmerie keep it within reach of their enemies? In all probability, the book was now in the King's possession and would be kept with him until it was needed- likely to prevent any prospective thieves from seizing it...

Basalt, one of said prospective thieves, cursed himself for not acting sooner. He'd meant to do this hours ago, once he was certain that he'd managed to get rid of the spies that had been watching him, but he'd gotten so caught up in the business of getting Elphaba into the Wizard's cell, acquiring workers to assist in the construction of the War Engine and retrieving the necessary supplies and survivors that by the time he'd made his tentative way back to Glinda's cell, the Grimmerie was already gone.

Mercifully enough, the King didn't have anything planned for it- at least not while the ritual was still being prepared for; from what Basalt had read in the King's journal, translating the spells of the Grimmerie had been virtually impossible for him, and he simply hadn't the time to waste on trying to do so. Doubly thankfully, since Glinda was still fast asleep, _she_ wasn't translating it either.

Satisfied that there was nothing else he could do, Basalt turned to leave.

And then, a voice behind him mumbled sleepily, "Basalt? Izzat you?"

From somewhere beneath the mantle of duvets and blankets, Glinda stirred, and slowly forced herself upright; for a moment or two, she sat there, yawning. Then, evidently still half-asleep, she mumbled, "Don't remember going to bed."

"You fell asleep at your desk, Miss Glinda," Basalt lied. "I took the liberty of helping you into bed."

"Hmmm. Thanks." She blinked for a moment, and glanced over at the desk. "Where's the Grimmerie?" she asked, suddenly wide awake.

Basalt's mind raced. "There have been a number of attempted thefts around the palace recently," he said at last. "All of them were of rare and priceless spellsbooks; until the thief can be apprehended, the Nome King has decided to keep the Grimmerie for safekeeping."

"Wonderful," said Glinda. "As if worrying about assassination wasn't bad enough, now we have to worry about getting burglarificated too." She sighed, and smiled wryly. "Oh well, I suppose it doesn't matter when I've still got my notes to work with and Elphie to help me with them."

Not for the first time since he'd met her, Basalt found himself reviewing the last few seconds of Glinda's statement and trying to comprehend what had just been said: she'd said _Elphie_ had been helping her with the Grimmerie, which was logically impossible unless Elphaba had somehow managed to overcome the King's suppression of her powers and teleport herself up here. And even if this were the case, why would she bother when – as far as she knew – Glinda was still enchanted to sleep?

The confusion must have shown on Basalt's face, because Glinda blushed and muttered, "I probably shouldn't have said that out loud."

"If you don't mind my asking, Miss Glinda, what did you mean?"

She hesitated for a moment. "I suppose it won't hurt if I tell you," she said at last. "Ever since I got here, I've been having these dreams- these incredibly vivid dreams about Elphaba. In the latest ones, she's been helping me out with some of the trickier sections of the book, giving me advice on how the different spells will be cast."

If anything, this sounded even more suspicious. "And your dreams are always about studying the spells?" he asked. "Elphaba never talks about anything else?"

"Well, she used to, on the first and second dreams mainly. Now that I've gotten over the worst of the nerves, she mainly helps me with the translation- all so I can see her again in the real world." She stretched for a moment. "If you'll excuse me for a moment, it's time I freshened up; I feel as though something's died in my mouth..."

_And that's likely the only reason the King allowed you to wake up at all, _Basalt thought._ He wanted you to attend to your body's needs before carrying on with the work; bedsores, muscle atrophy, dehydration and soiling would only worsen your health- he wants you fit enough to continue working without lapsing into illness._

As Glinda began shuffling towards the bathroom, his thoughts once again moved at a breakneck speed: from what little he'd read about human dreams, it wasn't unheard of for dreamers to realize the answers to questions they'd been thinking about while awake, but it seemed too coherent and convenient that Glinda should dream about this more than once; the fact that she now had a way of translating the Grimmerie without actually having the book in front of her – or even in the same room as her – made the dreams ever more questionable.

Could the Nome King have discovered a way to invade Glinda's dreams? It certainly didn't seem impossible with the power of the Ruby Slippers at hand. Worse still, what if the King could use this power to take the knowledge from Glinda once she'd finished translating?

_I should tell her about Elphaba,_ he thought, over the sound of water being poured next-door. _I should tell her that Elphaba is still alive; that way, this part of the King's plan fails here and now._

But reason made itself felt, along with the full and terrible weight of the bonds on his behaviour. How would he go about proving this? Bringing her downstairs to the Wizard's cell would be insanely over-complicated with the way the guards' patrol routes were changing. And what of the effect it would have on Elphaba herself? Basalt had difficulty understanding human emotions at the best of times, but here there was truly no way of predicting what the reaction of either party might be; for all he knew, the entire plan might be undone if Glinda's reaction were calamitous enough. And besides, it had been Elphaba's decision to leave her uninformed until the Nome King had been dealt with- he had to trust her judgement on this issue.

As Basalt puzzled over this dilemma, Glinda finally emerged from the bathroom; though she showed all the signs of having bathed, she still looked remarkably drowsy, and Basalt couldn't help but wonder if the King was casting another enchanted sleep on her. It made sense: now that her physical needs had been attended to, she would be sent back to sleep until she was needed... and if their plan failed and the ritual was a success, she might never wake again.

And in that moment, Basalt wanted nothing more than to tell her everything he knew: he wanted to explain that she didn't need to continue working for the King, that Elphaba was still alive, that there was still hope left for Oz. But then the moment passed, and logic (and the bonds that shackled his mind) returned: there was too much at stake to risk telling Glinda the truth now.

But there was one other thing left that he needed to say, if only because he might not get another chance. He cleared his throat. "Miss Glinda?"

"Yes, Basalt?"

"I... I just wanted to say that, during the short time I have known you, it has been a privilege to act as your Protector."

Glinda blinked in confusion. "Um... thank you. No offence meant, but what brought this on?"

"I have noticed your progress in the translation... and that of the substitute the King has arranged. It occurs to me that our time together may soon be at an end: you will be sent back in time to save Elphaba's life, and I will be either reassigned or promoted. In fact, at the speed events are occurring, your work might just be over by the time you next awake. So, in case I am called away from your side before the end, I want you know that my time in your service has been the greatest privilege of my life thus far: you gave me a name, and you taught me much about the world outside Nome territory. You even trusted me, even though you had no reason to do so. And... I wanted to thank you."

In spite of her weariness, Glinda smiled. "It's been good knowing you as well, Basalt," she said softly. "I've got quite a bit to thank you for as well, don't forget: you saved my life twice in a row, remember?"

"As you saved my life as well. And I think you may have helped save much more than that," he added, thinking of how the last few days would have carried on if Glinda had never told him of Elphaba, if her story of her "dead" friend hadn't driven him to seek out the truth. He'd probably have never learned the King's true nature, or discovered the King's plan... or even met Elphaba for that matter.

Glinda was blushing again. "I wouldn't know about that," she said. "I mean, I only-"

There was a loud thud from somewhere in the distance; as the echoes finally died away, the familiar-if-distant voice of the King boomed **"WHAT WAS **_**THAT?"**_ and from much closer, there was a great rumble of Nomes swarming through the earth to answer his call.

"I must go," Basalt said, hurriedly turning to leave. "The King will likely be expecting us to assemble in order to determine what happened; as your Protector, I will be required to investigate it as a potential threat to your safety. Good luck with your translation..."

Halfway to the wall, he stopped, briefly grappling with the urge to tell Glinda everything. At long last, he said softly, "I cannot pretend to know how events will proceed from here... but I can say this much: before this day is over, you _will_ see Elphaba alive again- one way or the other."

Then, before Glinda could ask any further questions, he was gone, soaring through the bedrock towards Elphaba's cell.

* * *

Elphaba had heard the thud as well, and had brought out the crystal ball to investigate, frantically scanning the upper floors of the palace for the source of the noise. It wasn't until she noticed the palace's butler marching higher still and the units of Nome guards following him that she realised the sound hadn't come from anywhere inside the palace at all. So she sent her scrying sight upwards, following the streams of Nomes hurrying their way up the turrets and towers of the Nome King's palace.

As they travelled, the guards hastily armed themselves with a bewildering array of weaponry, most of it apparently magical in nature; alongside the halberds and pickaxes, there were even things that resembled long-barrelled rifles and handheld artillery pieces. These walking arsenals were also accompanied by several distinguished-looking Nomes, their bodies adorned with magical runes and symbols made of gold and silver wiring, and all of them holding some form of magical device- a wand, a sceptre, a staff, or a spellbook. Obviously these were the magical might of the Nome army, and all of them were expecting an attack.

_Perhaps the War Council's finally arrived,_ Elphaba thought. _But if that's the case, why attack the uppermost floors?_

Meanwhile, the growing army of guards and magicians continued on upwards, some leaving the palace altogether as the route became too cramped for the legion to negotiate by themselves, ascending into the rock of the mountain itself, for that was where the sound had echoed from. Elphaba continued watching, now observing the very spirits of the Nomes as they flowed upwards, glowing with thaumaturgical energies in the darkness of the bedrock. To her eyes, it looked like a massive school of fish swimming through a pitch-black ocean, with the minnow-like butler leading and the shark-like figures of the soldiers following. And not too far behind them lurked the gargantuan shape of the Nome King, a leviathan of magical power slowly drifting through the mountain.

After almost two minutes of rising, they finally found the source of the noise on the outer slopes of the mountain the palace had been built under. With the army poised just inside the rock wall of the mountain and waiting for the order to attack, the butler hurried out to survey the situation.

Elphaba's ethereal vision followed him out into the morning light and saw- to her utter amazement- that, perched on a snowy outcropping far beneath the distinctive twin spires of the mountain, was none other than Dorothy Gale.

From behind her, there came the sound of a Nome entering the room, and she turned to see Basalt lumbering over. "Just in time," she said. "We need to get the War Engine moving _now!"_

"But it isn't finished; the rune plates haven't been welded on yet-"

"Basalt, Dorothy is _here!_ We need to get this damn machine moving by the time the ritual starts; we've got half an hour at the most- and that's if we're lucky! Get moving!"

Hastily turning back to the crystal ball, Elphaba scanned the outcropping for any sign of Mombi, or perhaps the Lion and the Tin Man, but found no discernible trace of any of them. What she _did_ find was the smashed remains of a very old velvet-cushioned sofa plastered across one side of the mountain; lying in the snow around Dorothy were the stuffed head of a Long-Antlered Gump, a vaguely human-shaped assembly of branches and rags with a carved pumpkin for a head, a badly-dented copper cauldron that some wit had decided to add human features to, and another sofa. And for reasons that utterly escaped Elphaba at that point, the Gump head was loudly insisting that he was perfectly happy just being a head, while Dorothy, the pumpkin-headed creature and the cauldron were trying to convince it that being strapped back onto the remaining sofa would be a good idea in the long run.

Elphaba massaged her temples and wondered – not for the first time – if she'd gone completely insane in the last few minutes.

However, once she had gotten her bearings and looked back at the surrealism playing out on the clifftops, she noticed something familiar about two of Dorothy's new companions- the Gump and the Pumpkinhead, specifically. It took her a while to determine, but at long last she recognized the distinctive signature to the magic that animated them, almost identical to the magic that she'd seen animating Mombi's heads. But from what little she could piece together of the conversation, it sounded as though the Gump had been assembled and animated by _Dorothy_, of all people, and he'd somehow managed to help them escape from Mombi.

_Well, if I _have_ gone mad, then at least it's a very entertaining form of madness. Plus, Boq and the Lion aren't here yet, so we've got a little more time to ready the War Engine before the ritual begins..._

Then, she remembered that the King was still nearby, and hastily shifted the crystal balls vision back inside the mountain, where the King now sat lazily in the ancient chambers of a long-dormant volcano as the butler explained who had just arrived on his doorstep.

"**She's much cleverer than I thought," **the King mused. **"Certainly much more capable than she was the last time. It certainly seems to be becoming a habit for my substitutes: first Glinda, now **_**this**_**. You're certain there's no sign of the chicken with her?"**

"Positive, Your Majesty; there's no sign of it anywhere on the mountain. In all likelihood, it died in the crash."

"**Double check: I don't want that chicken anywhere near this mountain."**

"The Lion and the Tin Man are still in the Emerald City, Your Majesty," one of the other Nomes reminded him. "If you wish, I can have transportation arranged for them within the hour-"

"**No," **said the King, his voice thoughtful. **"No, I think we can leave those two where they are for the moment. I think... yes, I can see it even now; I know the girl had a talent for befriending those left by the wayside, but I'd no idea that friendships would form so readily. The mechanical as a bodyguard, the thin one as a ward, the sofa as a vehicle, yes, I can see how the bonds of trust could form..." **

He cleared his throat. _"_**We have three perfectly decent substitutes here: undoubtedly constructed beings, but still possessed of some awkward equivalent of a soul. Even the mechanical one has..."** The King hesitated for a moment, and then chuckled softly. **"Oh, Pinhead, you were ingenious indeed when you made that one,"** he mused aloud. **"What sorcerer did you commission to build its mind once you were finished designing its body, I wonder?" **He sighed, and thought for a moment. **"We'll use all three of them- **_**and**_** the Scarecrow as the prelude to this little symphony."**

_So we don't have as much time as I thought. Damn. _

"**In the meantime, I want everyone gathered here to return to their posts- including the spies around the Emerald City-, and be ready to delay the Council when they arrive; I'll deal with the intruders here personally..."**

And with those words, the interior of the mountain was once again all in motion; the butler, the guards and the magicians (most of whom had been waiting in readiness for the order to attack) breaking ranks and flooding back down into the palace towards their posts; the Nome King beginning the slow but inexorable shift through the mountainside towards the outcropping; and, of course, Elphaba's roving ethereal vision following him.

Moments later, the King's face emerged from the mountainside; Elphaba had difficulty finding him at first, for his face was almost lost among the crags and rocks around him. It wasn't until his brow furrowed that she could even figure out where he was. Meanwhile, ten feet below him, Dorothy and her companions had finally managed to tie the Gump's head onto the sofa, much to the Gump's frustration; for a time, he let the chaos below him play out, with the Gump's bitter recriminations and Dorothy's attempts to reassure him echoing from one end of the outcropping to the other.

Then, the King cleared his throat with the sound of an avalanche.

"**TELL ME WHO YOU ARE," **he announced, **"AND WHY YOU HAVE COME ALL THE WAY TO **_**MY**_** KINGDOM... AND WHAT I CAN DO TO MAKE YOU HAPPY."**

There was a horrified silence, as all eyes slowly turned heavenward, finally noticing the colossal face staring back at them from the mountain. For the next few seconds, the only sound was the few startled mutterings from Dorothy's companions as they tried to figure out what to say; then, Dorothy herself stepped forward.

To Elphaba's surprise, the girl's expression was calm, and her voice almost perfectly even; there wasn't even the slightest trace of the fear and apprehension that she'd shown on her last visit. And as she watched the conversation play out, Elphaba couldn't help but wonder just how much Dorothy had changed since they'd last met: if the evidence was correct, she'd already somehow managed to animate a sofa and a trophy head with stolen magic, _and_ somehow escape from Mombi... and now here she was- standing on the enemy's doorstep without the slightest bit of fear.

What had _happened_ to her?

"My name is Dorothy Gale, Your Majesty," said Dorothy, bobbing a curtsy. "And these are my friends: Jack, Tik-Tok and the Gump..."

"**Not **_**the**_** Dorothy Gale from Kansas?"** the King asked, his eyebrows rising theatrically.

"Yes, Your Majesty. We've come to ask you to release the Scarecrow and to restore the Emerald City."

If anything, the King's eyebrows rose even higher. **"You believe that I have... **_**stolen**_** something, Dorothy, and you want me to give it back?"**

"Yes, Your Majesty."

"**So if someone steals something, you think the right thing is for them to give it back?"** the King asked, his voice teasing and thick with condescension.

"Yes, Your Majesty."

"**And what if they don't want to give it back?"**

Dorothy thought for a moment. "Then _we_ are here with our army to conquer you and _force _you to give it back!" she said, her voice brimful of confidence.

Elphaba's jaw dropped. _Alright,_ she thought, _who the hell are you, and what have you done with Dorothy Gale?_ The girl had _never_ shown this kind of bravado when she was last in Oz, not even when she was perfectly safe and happy. Quite frankly, it was so audacious that Elphaba would have applauded if only the threat had even the slightest chance of working; quite apart from the fact that none of the four had any obvious use in combat, it was clear that they hadn't intended to be caught up here so unprepared. Dorothy was bluffing, plain and simple- an impressive bluff, but a bluff nonetheless.

Meanwhile, the King was looking taken aback. **"Army?"** he echoed.

The copper cauldron answered him with a salute.

And then the crisp morning air was split by the landslide-like sound of the Nome King's laughter; from chuckling, it grew to guffawing, to cackling, to deafening roars of laughter that shook the mountain; hundreds of feet below, Elphaba felt the faint tremors reach her, and looked around to see the furniture of her cell shaking and trembling as the shockwaves travelled down the mountain. She turned back to the crystal ball just in time to see that part of the outcropping had finally given way under the onslaught: a crevasse had torn it's way along the rock, yawning wider and deeper with every second; with no time to react and nowhere to go but backwards off the cliff, Dorothy almost instantly found herself standing right at the edge of the abyss that the side of the mountain had become.

Her footing lost, she teetered for a moment and then fell headlong into the darkness below. Of course, the Nome King wasn't willing to let the centrepiece of his plan fall to her death; by the time Elphaba had located her again, Dorothy's fall had ground to an abrupt halt, leaving her floating almost seven hundred feet above the floor. Then, Elphaba felt another whisper of magic from the King, and Dorothy was in motion once again, soaring through the caverns towards the palace.

For almost every foot of the journey, she was staring, and to be honest, Elphaba couldn't blame her: this stretch of the palace grounds was almost completely taken up by a long stretch of glittering gemstones and geodes, lit from above by magical luminescence and refracting an eerie multicoloured glow upon the caverns around her.

"**ALL THE PRECIOUS STONES IN THE WORLD ARE MADE HERE, IN MY UNDERGROUND DOMINIONS,"** the King boomed, his voice reverberating dramatically across the tunnel. **"ALL CRAFTED BY MY SUBJECTS, AND ALL OWNED BY ME. SO IMAGINE HOW I FEEL,"**he continued, his voice taking on a note of annoyance, **"WHEN SOMEONE FROM THE WORLD ABOVE DIGS DOWN AND **_**STEALS **_**MY TREASURES; ALL THOSE EMERALDS IN THE EMERALD CITY REALLY BELONGED TO ME! I WAS MERELY RETAKING WHAT WAS MINE TO BEGIN WITH."**

"You have so much," Dorothy mumbled weakly.

"**BEG PARDON?"**

"You have so much of them!"

"**BUT THAT IS NOT THE POINT..."**

The King briefly fell silent, as a wall to Dorothy's left suddenly opened; Elphaba had just enough time to realise that she'd stopped right outside the audience chamber where Fiyero was being kept, before the King unceremoniously tossed Dorothy inside. She skidded across the tiled obsidian floor for about twenty feet, before crashing headlong into a rather familiar heap of straw-stuffed limbs.

"_**I**_** AM NOT THE THIEF," **the King continued, and once again paused for effect.

And in that moment, Dorothy and Fiyero sat up and recognized one another; true to the laws of drama, they shouted each other's names in mutual surprise and joy... then Elphaba felt the magic of a spell about to be cast- and realized what the King had meant when he'd mentioned a prelude: the ritual needed a sacrifice to initiate it.

Scrambling into motion, she reached out towards Fiyero with all the magical strength she could muster, hissing the words of the teleportation spell and willing her powers to ignore the crushing presence of the shackles that bound them. And in the crystal ball, she swore she could see the spell working: she could see the smoke gathering around him, ready to whisk him away to safety.

And then the Nome King's power swatted her aside like an insect.

And back in her room, several hundred feet from the audience chamber, Elphaba felt her feet leave the ground; as she tumbled backwards through the air, she had just enough time to absently hope that the King hadn't noticed her trying to interfere, before she hit the floor spine first. Clawing for a handhold on the smooth marble floor, she scrabbled to her feet just in time to see the crystal ball suddenly ablaze with light.

Peering past the blinding light, she caught a brief glimpse of the energies of the ritual tearing into Fiyero's body from all sides, and felt the terrible but familiar rush of skin-searing heat that she'd learned to associate with a magical transformation... and when she looked again, Fiyero was gone.

For a moment, she thought he'd been teleported away; then she recognized the fading magical signature to the spell, and realised that it had, indeed, been part of the ritual.

Fiyero had just been sacrificed.

Back in the audience chamber, the King boomed, **"**_**YOUR FRIEND**_** IS THE THIEF!"**

On some level, Elphaba was vaguely aware that she was shedding tears; on some level, she knew she was cursing herself for not feeling grief or rage. And while she wanted to give full vent to every last drop of hatred and sorrow in her body, to scream and cry and weep that she would never see Fiyero again, to reproach herself for failing- even after all the planning and scheming and mad improvisation- and to swear bitter vengeance against the King... she couldn't: the course of the last few critical minutes had taken the wind out of her sails. She'd already pushed herself to the extremes of joy, rage and sorrow in the space of just under twenty hours, and all she could feel was a deep and overwhelming sense of exhaustion.

And it wasn't just _emotional _exhaustion, either: she felt so damnably tired it almost hurt to keep her eyes open. And on some level, she found herself wishing that she could just crawl into bed and sleep through the entire sacrifice- for she could hardly stand to see the rest of the dreadful thing progress, knowing that she'd already lost.

She was _so_ tired...

So, very, very tired...

_You're in shock,_ a distant part of her brain informed her. _You're not thinking straight; you need to try and get a grip on reality._

Elphaba ignored it.

The King had been clever, she realised absently: he'd told her about the ritual so readily, almost flippantly, that Elphaba had assumed that he'd made a mistake, that he was so proud of his little scheme and so anxious to let his guests know about it that he'd just given away every last detail of the plan. Well, he hadn't: he'd only told Elphaba what she'd already determined. He'd left out how he planned to convince Dorothy; he'd left out most of the rules of the ritual; he hadn't even told her _how_ the ritual itself would proceed or how the participants would be sacrificed.

He'd told her just enough to get her hopes up, and because of that, because of her own foolhardy overconfidence, Fiyero was...

She glanced back into the crystal ball, some vague trace of denial left in her brain hoping that Fiyero had merely been hidden under a veil of illusions, and his sacrifice had just been a trick to fool the King's latest acquisition. But no; not a trace of him could be found: the room was empty except for Dorothy and the Nome King's colossal face.

"What happened to the Scarecrow?" Dorothy whispered. "Where is he?"

Elphaba swore that the crystal ball actually picked up the faintest echo of laughter from the King. **"I transformed him," **he said smugly, **"Into an ornament."**

_No wonder I couldn't find any trace of him,_ Elphaba thought absently.

"**An amusing and beautiful ornament for my palace," **the King continued.** "I had been planning to do it for some time, and your coming here... reminded me."**

He paused for effect. **"Thank you."**

With that, he vanished back into the wall; by the time the last facial feature had returned to the bare granite that it had been formed from, Dorothy was banging her fists against the wall and shouting _"He never stole anything! They were there when he became King!"_

If the King had heard her, he didn't reply, but that didn't appear to matter to Dorothy; for a few seconds, she stood there, futilely punching the wall. Then, at long last, she very slowly slumped to the floor, breathing heavily; she briefly scanned the room, looking for some kind of escape route. But of course, there weren't any: the hole in the wall was already sealing shut behind her, and even if she could have gotten out through it, it would have only led Dorothy through the labyrinth of tunnels and caverns that surrounded the palace. She was trapped, and- as far as she knew- left for dead.

Elphaba wasn't surprised when the first sob echoed across the room. What _did_ surprise her was when, rather than begging to be released or calling for help, Dorothy whimpered, "He never stole the emeralds, they were there when he..."

The rest was lost in the tears that followed. This wasn't the non-stop bawling that had driven Elphaba to the very brink of insanity a year ago; if anything, this was even worse: a very quiet, almost whispered procession of sobs, punctuated by disjoined attempts to explain that the Scarecrow hadn't stolen the Emeralds. And, in spite of all the hatred and all the disgust she'd felt for the girl since the day she'd met her, Elphaba found herself feeling sorry for Dorothy. Then again, how could she not? They were in the same position, all things considered: they were both trapped; their plans had fallen apart; their friends were too far away to make any kind of difference; as far as the two of them knew, Fiyero was gone forever...

_And we're both crying,_ Elphaba thought, absently reaching up to brush the tears from her eyes.

For fifteen seconds, the crying carried on, the faint sobs echoing plaintively around the room. And just as Elphaba was beginning to wonder if the King was going to let her stew in her misery all day, when the granite just above Dorothy's head began to quiver and distort as the Nome King finally emerged from the wall, now almost human-sized. He gazed down at the shaking figure below him, his expression remote and unreadable; then, he very gently reached down and put his hand on her shoulder- his enormous palm almost covering her entire back.

"**Shhhhh..."**

Time passed, with the Nome King's soothing entreaties briefly mingling with Dorothy's attempts to defend the Scarecrow. And it could have been Elphaba's imagination, but the King's tone sounded genuinely sympathetic in that moment.

"**I didn't realize he meant so much to you,"** he said softly.

_That makes two of us._

"But I keep telling you, he didn't steal the Emeralds, they were-"

"**I know... but the Wizard is nowhere to be found, and someone must shoulder the blame for what was done to us. But all's not lost yet, Dorothy. I know just the thing to cheer you up..." **

As he spoke, behind Dorothy, the wall opened again and promptly disgorged the bedraggled figures of Tik-Tok, Jack and the Gump upon the audience chamber's floor. **"You and your friends can play a little game- a gamble of sorts for the Scarecrow's life, a price my subjects would be happy to pay in exchange for your dear friend. And I'd bet that, if you were willing to take a chance, you'd get the Scarecrow back after all. You'd risk something for that, wouldn't you?"**

There was a pause, and then without saying a word, Dorothy nodded resignedly.

* * *

Thankfully, the choruses of "Make way for his Majesty!" alerted Elphaba to the King's approach, giving her just enough time to hide her bag and crystal ball under the bed. Unless of course, the deceitful old bastard already knew about them and was coming up here to gloat over the fact that he'd managed to succeed in spite of this, which meant that there'd be no point in concealing _anything._

But at present, Elphaba was running out of ways she could possibly care. So, she sat on the bed, and patiently waited for the Nome King to finally appear.

When he finally stepped free of the wall, though, the expected gloating didn't arrive with him; indeed, the King's expression seemed almost downcast in comparison with his usual smug good cheer. And rather than speaking, for the next few seconds he just stood by the entrance as if lost in thought. **"I know what you tried to do,"** he said at last. **"I felt you straining against the restrictions I placed on you power... impressive, to say the least."**

"Does it matter?" Elphaba asked, her voice dull and inflectionless. "I failed; Fiyero's dead."

"**You make it sound so permanent; his essence has been dissolved into the fabric of the ritual, but rest assured that can be easily remedied before it ends: if you like, I can bring Fiyero back and stop the ritual right here and now- if you'd be willing to provide your expertise in translating the Grimmerie." **He offered his usual persuasive smirk, but his heart clearly wasn't in it; if anything, the smile that grace the King's features just looked weary.

"We've been over this before, and I gave you a very succinct answer: I'm not interested in helping."

"**Then you'll just have to wait: once the ritual's over, you'll see him again sooner or later- it all depends on when and where you'd like to start your knew life."**

"You really are determined to give me a happy ending aren't you?"

"**And why not? It may be difficult for you to believe this, but I respect you: despite all your self-loathing, you're a remarkable human being, and not just because of your powers; you had the will and the determination to rebel against a dictator others were too indolent or cowardly to oppose; you carried on even when nobody else dared to stand by you... and even when you were brought down by the cowardice and pettiness of others, you defeated the Wizard nonetheless- through the successor which you had chosen. And of course, in case you'd forgotten, you managed to fake your death with nothing more than a bucket of water, a trapdoor, and a rumour."**

"I'd be flattered if you weren't still threatening to leave Fiyero as free-floating energies for you to feed upon. Speaking of which, you don't seem to have changed that much: are you sure the ritual's working?"

"**Positive: this is but the foundation upon which my humanity will be constructed; as such, the first sacrifice need never be willing, as they say."**

Elphaba tasted bile in her throat, and only just managed to stop herself from leaning forward and punching the Nome in the face. "Or the second," she added coldly. "Or the third, the fourth, the fifth _or _the sixth... truth be told, I don't know _how_ many sacrifices you've made in the last week, but I doubt that any of them were willing. So why does this one bother you, I wonder?"

"**It doesn't. It's just that every so often, it all feels so very... petty. So **_**beneath **_**me."**

"An affront to your Kingly dignity, was it?"

"**I haven't possessed Kingly dignity in a long time, Elphaba,"** he intoned gravely. **"The day I let my kingdom fall into the hands of the War Council stripped me of any right I had to keep my hands clean or think myself better than the usurpers."**

"But you're having doubts, aren't you?" she said- almost accusingly.

"**Doubt is good. It means that I'm not yet insane."**

_Given the way you've been juggling three or four different plans at once, I doubt that very much. _"What do you mean?" she asked.

"**Have you ever seen a madman question his delusions? Have you ever seen a lunatic without absolute certainty in truth of his visions and paranoia? Insanity is conviction never gripped by doubt, Elphaba. Even though I know that this cause is the only rational course of action, I..." **He blinked and for a moment, Elphaba had the faintest inkling of just how old the Nome King truly was, if only through the weariness that seemed to descend on him at that point. **"Sometimes, I look back everything I did when I truly held power: I saw the rise and fall of empires, and I helped a few of them rise and fall myself; I expanded our underground dominion beneath countries you've never heard of, and made contact with beings you couldn't possibly imagine; I collected libraries and trophies from one end of my Kingdom to the other. Oh, and the magical research I spearheaded..."** His tone heavy with nostalgia, he sighed. **"And then I look back on what I've been doing over the last few days: once I ruled supreme over the underground of twelve different countries- and now I'm reduced to bullying a child, all just to get my hands on the one thing that might change things for the better. How it could have come to this, I wonder..."**

He hesitated for a moment, and then asked, **"Tell me, when Dorothy was locked in the cellars of Kiamo Ko... while you were waiting for her to give up the Ruby Slippers, did you ever think of how everything had fallen apart in the last few days, that all your plans had come to nothing, that your great fight for Animal freedom had been reduced to threatening a child for a memento of your sister? Did you ever think that?"**

"Of course I did," said Elphaba flatly. "But as I recall, you seem to think that I really am unlimited."

"**You _are_... but circumstances bring us all to the brink of despair, King, pauper or prodigy. And, of course, I wonder if anything I've done over the last week was worth the effort."**

Silence followed.

"What are you going to do?"

"**What I must; my pride means nothing compared to the fate of my people... and doubts can always be buried."** As he spoke, something on the right side of the Nome King's face glowed faintly in the darkness, bathing his face in a fiery orange radiance; for a moment, the King didn't appear to notice it. However, he must have seen Elphaba staring, because he almost immediately swept a hand across his face, brushing the light off his cheek and away into a corner of the room. **"I've kept them waiting long enough,"** he said absently. **"It'll all be over soon enough... and perhaps..."**

He shook his head, and left without saying another word.

For a moment, Elphaba pondered everything she'd just been told: the King had said that Fiyero wasn't beyond rescuing, that the ritual could be undone "before it ends." What did that mean?

As she thought, she stood and crossed the room until she found the corner where the light had fallen: whatever the King had swept off his face was still there on the floor, glowing faintly. Elphaba hadn't seen lava too many times in her life, but after all the books she'd read on it, all the times she'd smelt the terrible whiff of brimstone in the air and the few thankfully rare occasions she'd felt the distant heat on her face, there was no mistaking the tiny blob of liquid for anything other than magma.

A single tear of molten rock.

* * *

Minutes later, the Nome King was back in the audience chamber, smile fastened firmly back on, explaining the details of the "little game" he wanted his guests to play. Dorothy's tears had finally dried, but it was obvious that she didn't have much confidence in what was going to happen next, judging by the expression of dread frozen on her face. Elphaba couldn't blame her.

"**You can go and inspect my ornament collection," **the King was saying. **"At the moment, the Scarecrow's new form has placed among the objects I have on display: each of you will have three chances to guess which of them is the Scarecrow; touch the right ornament and say the words "Oz" at the same time, and the Scarecrow will be restored and you may leave the palace."** He allowed this information to sink in. **"Sound fair enough?"**

As the four of them whispered amongst themselves, Elphaba found herself thinking back to the lessons on magical rituals she'd attended back at Shiz: rituals made in the style of a parlour game were just as ancient as the Nome King had claimed, but also renowned for their complexity. They had to work according to the rules of the game if they were to work as intended- meaning that Dorothy actually _did_ have a chance to win if she or one of the other guessed right. Unfortunately, having seen the ornament collection that now crowded the cellars, Elphaba knew that the chances of finding the right ornament with only twelve guesses would be close to zero. Plus, losing would almost certainly result in a sacrifice for each player.

If there was a solution to this, it wasn't going to be found in teleporting them to safety, now that the King was alerted to Elphaba's attempts at breaking the shackles on her magic. She'd have to think _very_ carefully on this. She'd told Basalt to keep up the work on the War Engine and wait for her signal; hopefully, by that time, she'd have figured out the loophole they needed.

"Alright," said Dorothy at last, "We accept."

The King smiled, and with a gesture, sent another multitude of stone hands pouring across the wall the Dorothy's left, drawing it back like a curtain to reveal a long spiralling flight of stairs leading into the darkness.

"**Why doesn't the sofa go first?"** the King suggested, nodding at the Gump.

"But I don't have anything to touch _with!"_

"**You can use your antlers."**

The Gump sighed, and muttered, "I should've quit while I was ahead," before taking to the clawed heels of his sofa body and lumbering awkwardly towards the stairs, still grumbling bitter recriminations. Once he was past the threshold, the wall shut once again.

For the next twenty to thirty minutes, the guests were left without the slightest hint of what was going on downstairs: to pass the time, the King conjured a table of refreshments for Dorothy and the others to sit around, compete with oddly stone-textured cakes and goblets of bubbling silver fluid. For quite a while, conversation went nowhere, except on how the food tasted, what the food was, and if it was safe to eat.

Eventually, the King began asking questions about what Dorothy had been up to since she'd returned to Oz, and she'd reluctantly gone into some detail. Listening with only half an ear, Elphaba once again found herself wondering just what had caused the girl to change so much in the last year. It couldn't _just_ be the passage of time, could it?

Then, from somewhere downstairs, there was a low rumble of thunder.

Elphaba hastily directed the crystal ball's vision down into the cellars, and eventually found the Gump, antlers pointed awkwardly at a marble statuette. "So much for that one," he grunted, and slumped off to another nearby ornament, chosen apparently at random. Touching his left antler to it, he proclaimed "Oz!" only to be greeted with yet another ominous boom of thunder in the distance.

Back upstairs, Tik-Tok whispered, "The-King-mentioned-a-risk. What-is-it-that-we-are-risking?"

As if answering him, a thunderclap boomed across the audience chamber, and in its wake, a shockwave overturned the table and flung all three of the guests to the ground. In between the vivid flashes of lightning, Elphaba saw the Nome King's body ripple and distort as the energies that had once composed the Gump flowed into him. And in that terrible moment of transformation, something in the King's mind escaped and catapulted itself into Elphaba's head, a single shriek of maddened, cackling ecstasy.

When the light finally returned, Elphaba finally saw the King's new form: still stone, still crudely statuesque, but now he looked out at the world with human eyes.

And it might have been her imagination, but there was something very disturbing about that unearthly gaze, something in the way the iron-grey eyes caught the light that told Elphaba that whatever sanity the Nome King had possessed had just gone spiralling down the plughole...

... and, impossibly enough, the situation had just gone from bad to worse.


	32. Desperate Measures

A/N: The next chapter, ladies and gentlemen! We're slowly approaching the climax, and I'm going to do my best to make it a show-stopper.

Rest assured, Inbalwolf, I'm not going to leave this story unfinished; I hope you enjoy reading the next few chapters, and thank you for your review.

To all my readers, I hope you enjoy this latest chapter: reviews and constructive criticism are welcome!

So, without further ado, read, review and enjoy!

Disclaimer: Wicked- not mine. Take my word for it.

* * *

"**Next,"** said the King briskly.

The transformation that he'd just undergone had refined his features, and brought a certain degree of humanity to his face, allowing Elphaba to see the faintest hints of a smile in the corners of his mouth, details that would have been lost in the crags of the King's original face. There were other subtle changes, too, however: the tines on his head now protruded from the circlet of a stone crown upon his heavy brow; the vaguely beard-like shape about his jaw had become a full-fledged beard- once again rendered in stone.

Meanwhile, Dorothy and the others began clambering upright (Tik-Tok taking slightly longer than the others) and the stairwell "door" slowly began peeling itself open again. Once the three of them were on their feet again, they glanced expectantly at the door for a minute, before Dorothy finally asked, "Where's the Gump?"

"**He's turned into an ornament."**

"_What?_"

"**An ornament,"** he elaborated, his smile broadening horribly. **"A knick-knack; a trinket. He failed to guess correctly, and now he's become part of my collection."**

Over the shouts of dismay, Dorothy protested, "But that's not fair!"

The King frowned, the ghost of an offended expression crossing his face. **"You **_**said**_** you were willing to take a risk,"** he said. **"It seemed fair to me..."** his smile grew once again, twisting his face obscenely out of shape. **"...And what I think is all that matters."**

"But you didn't tell us about it!"

"**You didn't ask!"** said the King smugly. His tone suddenly turned menacing: **"Perhaps you'd like to visit my fiery furnace? It's always an option if you don't want to continue playing!"** He waved a hand, and without warning, a solid _wall_ of flame burst from the opposite wall and rocketed towards them, stopping less than eight feet from Dorothy's face. _What the hell is he doing!?_ Elphaba thought, as Dorothy and the others frantically backpedalled away from the fire. _Any closer and he would have barbecued all three of them._

"**Next!" **the King laughed, the dying fire casting a hellish orange glow upon his face. **"Pumpkinhead!"**

For a moment, it looked as though Pumpkinhead was going to panic: then, his posture sagged in resignation as he turned to Dorothy. "Being an ornament will probably be hardest on you, Dorothy," he said, trying to sound reassuring- and failing, "You're used to sleeping, eating- all those other things that living people can do. I won't miss them, though-"

"Don't say that! We won't become ornaments; we've still got a chance to win!"

Jack shook his head. "We've got three chances each, and it's not going to be enough."

"But you can't just-"

"I'll be okay; I've never eaten, slept or done any of the other things – so I won't miss any of them. I won't have to worry about my head spoiling anymore..." His voice had now taken on the particularly desperate tone common to people trying to accept something horrible in their immediate future. "The Gump's probably happy now," he continued, voice almost on the edge of hysteria. "He doesn't have to worry about having a body anymore. And Tik-Tok's not even alive; he won't miss eating or sleeping either."

"I-have-always-valued-my-lifelessness," Tik-Tok concurred.

"You see? You don't have to worry about us: we'll be fine." There was a pause, as Jack leaned over to whisper into Dorothy's ear; zooming closer to the two, Elphaba could just about make out the words, "See if you can find a way out once it's your turn: don't look back- just run!"

Dorothy looked as though she was going to argue; then the familiar look of resignation fell over her like a shroud, and she could only nod sadly. Then, she craned upwards, and whispered, "Be safe, Bilina." Elphaba couldn't discern "Bilina's" reply. But, looking carefully through the magnified imagine in the crystal ball, she saw - protruding from one of Jack's carved eyesockets- the face of a hen skulking deep inside the hollow of Jack's head.

_And_ _just like that, we have a new weapon,_ Elphaba thought. _But will we ever get an opportunity to use it?_

* * *

Perhaps due to Jack's obvious fear, the guessing took much longer this time; so, while Dorothy and Tik-Tok waited for their turn in oppressive silence, the Nome King quite naturally ventured up to Elphaba's room to talk- though this time Elphaba had to marvel at the speed the King had somehow managed to leave the audience chamber; one minute he was waiting downstairs with Dorothy and Tik-Tok, and the next he was rumbling down the corridor towards the cell.

"**You can feel it, can't you?" **the King whispered. If he still felt any trace of the regret he'd voiced a few minutes ago, he was doing a very good job of hiding it, for all Elphaba could hear in his voice in that moment was excitement and giddy triumph, sprinkled thickly with megalomania. **"The power,"** he continued. **"Working its way through me, building towards a crescendo... I never imagined it would be this intoxicating. I never thought the power would feel so glorious." **He smiled hideously. **"And to think, once upon a time, I hesitated. Can you imagine that? So many months ago, I wondered if I could harness this magic, if the ritual could possibly work. Now, I know that I was right all along." **

Elphaba could only stare at him for a moment. And then the penny twigged: suddenly, the Nome King's change in behaviour made horrifying sense. "You were right to doubt," she said quietly.

The smile vanished from the King's face, and suddenly Elphaba found herself on the receiving end of the King's unearthly gaze. For the first time in her life, she found it very hard to return such a stare. "You might have been able to channel the power in the Ruby Slippers as a Nome," she continued, forcing herself to look the King in the eye. "But as a human-"

"**I am **_**not**_** human," **said the King icily.

"You're getting close. And now that you actually have an organic brain, its being unhinged; you've hoarded the magic and purified it for so long that you're now channelling more than you can mentally deal with- it's driving you mad."

"**And where, might I ask, does your incontrovertible evidence spring from?"**

"I've researched thaumaturgical psychosis, and I know the symptoms well enough to know that I'm watching them play out here and now: in fact, I'd bet that you've been feeling a few of the tamer symptoms for a while now; it might explain those mood-swings I saw on display."

"_**What**_** mood swings?"**

"That temper tantrum you threw yesterday- the one where you burned Curter alive. Even you didn't think that was rational behaviour, remember?"

"**You presume to know what I think?"** the King chuckled. **"And more to the point, when did this happen? I don't recall anyone by the name of Curter, nor do I remember killing him."**

Elphaba tried not to groan in despair; it was even worse than she thought. "What about that depressive funk you were in a few moments ago? Is that normal for Nomes, emotionally speaking?"

The King smiled, face blankly uncomprehending; clearly, he didn't remember a minute of that conversation. Every instance of weakness and doubt was being erased by the rising tide of energy and egotism in his brain; it probably didn't help that the King had been arrogant and proud even before the ritual began, something that not even the effects of the Ruby Slippers could justify.

"Those were _minor_ symptoms," she continued, determined not to be interrupted. "Now that you're organic enough to feel the full effect of the magic, you're moving onto second-stage symptoms: you're getting reckless. I felt that fire you unleashed down there- what would have happened if it had reached Dorothy or the others?"

The King shrugged. **"They would have burned,"** he said flatly. **"They would have screamed in agony. They would have begged for mercy... and I would have smothered the flames, healed their wounds, and got them back to work."**

"How in hell does that sound even _vaguely_ reasonable?" Elphaba shouted. "You're not even using _half_ of the power yet! What happens when you finally unlock the Slippers' true power? Do you really think you'll be sane enough to remember what you were planning to do?"

Without saying a word, the King reached out and seized her by the left wrist; Elphaba barely had a chance to struggle before a jet of purified magical energy shot out of her captor's hand and into her veins. The pain was instantaneous and searing; it felt as though her blood had been replaced with molten iron, and it was slowly frying her from the inside out. Then the pain was suddenly replaced with pleasure, leaving her floating in a euphoric haze as visions of glory and triumph played out before her eyes: the Wizard kneeling before her, his great mechanical face lying in ruins behind him; a victory parade, her face painted on every banner and every marcher shouting her name in adulation; Nessarose hugging her in joy and gratitude; there was even a split-second glimpse of Glinda's face, before the tide of pleasure finally evaporated once and for all, leaving Elphaba sprawled across the floor, retching as her gut churned from the energy that had been channelled through her body.

"**Poor Elphaba,"** the King purred. **"So reluctant to believe in yourself; so afraid of harnessing your true power. It's no surprise you disparage what I've attained; it stemmed from your true potential, the very thing you've learned to distrust."**

"That's nothing to do with it!" Elphaba choked.

"**Is it? I felt your mind twist and turn with the vision I showed you; every time you caught a glimpse of triumph, you could only think back to the day you claimed yourself "limited." Would it hurt you to trust yourself once more?"**

"I do," Elphaba insisted, smothering a newfound of wellspring of fear; if the King could now read minds, it now meant that almost nothing could be kept secret from him. She could only hope he didn't know how to direct it, otherwise the plan was officially dead in the water. "Why do you think I came here?" she continued. "Do you think I'd have come here if I didn't trust in my own strength?"

"**You didn't do that out of confidence in your powers or yourself; you did that because you feared for the safety of your friends, because you didn't want to see Fiyero and Glinda hurt on your account. Oh, Elphaba, if you could only learn to be a **_**little**_** bit like me... if you could only embrace your true power... you'd be so **_**magnificent..."**_

Elphaba sighed furiously. "Listen to yourself! You're not thinking straight: you're high on magical current, and it's driving you even further over the edge; don't you remember what you told me a few minutes ago? "Insanity is conviction never gripped by doubt." Do you remember that?"

The King's expression suddenly blurred between arrogance and pity, and Elphaba knew that his memory of the event was already circling the plughole. **"You really do keep trying to defeat me, even when you've already lost,"** he said smugly. **"It's a habit that'll be rewarded soon enough- if you'll wait just a little longer..."**

"You'd best be off, in that case; your guests will be wondering why you keep leaving the room."

"**What makes you think I left the audience chamber this time?"** said the King, smiling mysteriously.

"Well, the fact that you're here, for a start."

The smile broadened. **"And someone with an infinite wellspring of reality-warping magic can't be in two places at once?"** he asked teasingly.

And with that, he was gone; no sinking back into the earth, no pyrotechnics, not even the sound of air being displaced- once second he was standing in the middle of the room, the next, he'd simply disappeared. A quick glance in the crystal ball revealed that he was back in the throne room, sipping a glass of molten silver and gazing confidently down at his two guests.

Tik-Tok and Dorothy didn't look nearly as self-assured.

"I-Do-Not-Hold-Out-Much-Hope-For-Jack," Tik-Tok was saying. "He-Has-Many-Excellent-Qualities, But-Thinking-Is-Not-One-Of-Them."

"Maybe he'll get lucky," said Dorothy, her voice dull and inflectionless. Elphaba didn't need to look at her face to know that whatever had been powering her resolve so far had finally collapsed; she'd given up hope.

There was a distant rumble of thunder.

"**Two... guesses... left,"** whispered the King, smugly.

Elphaba sighed furiously; she couldn't let this carry on any longer- she had to figure out a way of sabotaging the ritual (and getting Bilina close enough to the King to pose a danger). She considered ordering Diggs to send the War Machine on a charge directly towards the ornament collection – if only to force the King to take action, and buy a little time for them in the process. She gave up the idea almost immediately; with no way of telling just which ornament was a transformed victim or even knowing if the Nome King would react the intended way, sending the machine on the warpath might kill Fiyero _and_ Bilina before she could order a course-change.

But on the other hand, there was something else...

Maybe- _just_ maybe...

* * *

Several floors below, Diggs and the others heard the rumble of thunder, and looked pensively amongst themselves. By now, the former Wizard's story had long since run its course, now, the remaining members of the resistance movement sat at the back of the room, digesting the knowledge which had been practically dumped in their laps. Even though- by his own admission- Diggs hadn't told the entire story, it was still almost unbelievable to the four of them; even Javelin's newfound rancour had been temporally silenced.

Appropriately enough, as the story had come to a close, most of the finishing touches to the War Machine's structure had concluded too; the boiler and the drillhead had been bolted into place, and the last of the rune-plates were slowly being welded to the machine's armour-plated hull. Now, as Diggs explained its inner workings, the finished machine sat in the centre of the room, a monstrous behemoth of steel and brass mounted on a set of imposing wheels, connected together with thick leather belts.

"They're called continuous tracks," Diggs explained. "I saw a few being used back in my world around the time I left, mainly for farming equipment and the like; here, they'll help the War Machine deal with uneven ground and unstable terrain. The last thing we want is for the whole thing to get caught on the back steps on our way through the palace."

"What about the boiler?" Rasp wanted to know. "Is that going to be safe?"

"Of course; it should be perfectly safe to use and to fuel. Of course," he added, "I'd still have one of Basalt's friends working it- just for safety-sake."

"So you pilot, one of the workers tends to the boiler, Woolwax works the rocket launchers, and Javelin-"

"Acts as a distraction," Javelin cut in. "I haven't been much use in the last few days; if nothing else I can keep the Nomes from dealing with you too quickly."

"Just to be clear, you aren't just doing this to guilt me into making a heroic sacrifice or anything like that, right?"

"Fuck off, Wizard."

Rasp coughed loudly. "As I was saying; Diggs is the pilot, Woolwax is the gunner, Javelin's the distraction, Brollan _insists _on fighting in hand-to-hand combat for reasons that still escape me... at the risk of destroying the atmosphere of hope and certainty, what am I supposed to do?"

"Well, we can always use a support gunner..."

"Well, if there are enough launchers available, maybe. And what's Basalt supposed to do?

There was a low grinding of rock from the wall, and Basalt almost dived free of it: "Act as bodyguard to Miss Glinda," he answered flatly. "I must be brief: Miss Elphaba is pondering a question and she needs answers promptly." He turned to Diggs. "Why did you choose Dorothy Gale as your emissary when she arrived in the Emerald City?"

Diggs looked blank. "Well... I suppose it was at least _partly_ out of desperation: I'd just about given up on actually finding and capturing Elphaba through normal means, especially once the trap failed. So, I thought, why not try something unorthodox? Besides, I hadn't made the mistake of unveiling myself that time. And if nothing else, Dorothy was a figurehead; she mightn't have been able to actually kill a witch in person, but I'll be damned if the people didn't believe she'd managed it in Nessarose' case. _And_ she'd managed to gather quite a few supporters by that time, if you get my drift; of course, that payed off when the Tin Man rallied them to fight on her side as the Witch Hunters."

"Was that all?"

"No: there was something else she had that nobody else in all of Oz had on their side: luck; somehow, her house gets dragged across worlds by a tornado and isn't torn apart by the wind; it lands violently enough to kill Nessarose, but not Dorothy; somehow, Dorothy manages to get all the way through Munchkinland and not only survive, but gather three very unique followers in the process. Even if you don't believe in guardian angels, you've got to admit the girl led a charmed life." He shrugged. "You know what they say- "God looks after small children and drunks," right?"

"Might explain how _you_ got so far in life," said Javelin snidely.

"Oh come on! I might have helped myself to a few bottles of the elixir from time to time, but that doesn't make me a drunk!"

"And _that's_ what offends you, is it? You're perfectly happy being named a murderer, a tyrant and a conman, but it's being called a drunk that you can't accept? Small wonder a hick with delusions of grandeur would have muddled priorities!"

"How many times do I have to say this? _I know what I did_- the Nome King spent a year detailing it in my blood! You don't have to keep reminding me!"

"Well pardon me if nobody ever told you that brainwashing and mass enslavement were wrong before the Nome King captured you. Pardon me for assuming that someone would try to drill that novel idea into your wrinkled rustic rural cranium before then. Pardon me for imagining that you'd try to take responsibility for what you did _before_ you ran from Oz with your tail clenched between the cheeks of your haemorrhoid-spotted ass."

"Thank you for your time, gentlemen," said Basalt quietly, and vanished back into the wall; thanks to the argument, nobody even noticed him leave.

* * *

The thunderclap sounded again for the third time, and didn't stop for several seconds: lightning once again flickered violently across the audience chamber and Elphaba caught a brief glimpse of Dorothy clutching Tik-Tok's hand in sheer terror, before her attention hastily turned to the next stage of the Nome King's awful transformation.

Between the flashes of lightning, his skin rippled and twisted almost completely beyond recognition, taking on the bizarre fluidity of molten rock; his features shifted, gaining definition and somehow becoming all the more hideous for it; his eyes seemed to glow a vivid blue, and through every single moment of that repulsive metamorphosis, the King's mind was cackling in ecstasy.

At last, he stopped changing, and looked down at his guests as something neither human nor Nome: he no longer had stone in place of skin and flesh, but what had grown to replace it could not be easily described; to Elphaba's eyes, it had the malleability of flesh, but it still held the texture and appearance of rock. His beard and moustache were similar; though they moved with all the flexibility of hair, they looked more like rocky projections than anything else. Even the thick robes he now wore still looked as though they were made of granite. And while the King's eyes were still as human as they'd been for the last few minutes, unless Elphaba was surely mistaken, the pupils had shrunk to the size of pinpricks.

There was an ominous pause, and then the King very slowly inhaled and exhaled for the first time in his life: he now had lungs.

"**NEXT!"** he boomed. **"THE ARMY OF OZ!"**

Tik-Tok snapped to attention, and turned to Dorothy. "Do-Not-Worry," he intoned, his otherwise toneless voice somehow projecting confidence. "_I_-Am-Going-To-Guess-Correctly." And without another word, he turned and began the long, ponderous march towards the stairs.

A cursory glance in Dorothy's direction revealed that she no longer looked despairing; now she looked utterly defeated. Elphaba knew that expression all too well; she'd seen it staring back at her from the mirror almost every hour since she'd taken up residence at Kiamo Ko.

A cursory glance in the King's direction revealed that he'd decided to take advantage of his newfound lungs by smoking; Elphaba had no idea where he'd conjured the stone pipe _or_ the tobacco, but he'd already lit up by the time she'd looked back at him, and was surrounded by a small cloud of sulphurous fumes.

"**Why did you come here?"** he asked Dorothy. For a moment, Elphaba wondered if the flow of magic though the King's brain had overpowered his memory once again, but then she recognized the self-satisfied edge to his voice: he was toying with her, sadism now prevalent in his power-crazed brain.

"I told you why," said Dorothy softly.

"**You came all this way... for a Scarecrow?"**

Dorothy nodded.

Overhead, thunder rumbled.

"**Are you sure you didn't come back for **_**these?"**_

Two vaguely-formed feet emerged from beneath his robe, wearing-

"My ruby slippers!" Dorothy shouted, diving for them. Once Elphaba had finally smothered the involuntary surge of rage at hearing the only surviving memento of Nessa once again claimed by the girl, she saw Dorothy frozen in place, transfixed by the otherworldly red glow that the slippers now cast on the room.

"**No, no, no,"** the King purred triumphantly. **"**_**My**_** Ruby Slippers. They just fell out the sky one day; you were **_**so**_** anxious to get home- so eager to cast off everything of Oz that the Slippers obliged you."** He gazed down at the glittering rubies that now adorned his feet. **"They're very powerful; in fact, they made it possible for me to conquer the Emerald City and all the other territories of Oz."** He paused for effect, and then whispered, **"Thank you."**

For a moment, Dorothy's expression remained frozen in horror and disbelief, her eyes shining with tears as if she were about to cry again; then, her eyes very gently slid shut, and her face contorted with despair and... self-loathing?

_Oh for Oz's sake, she's _buying_ it; she actually believes the sadistic old bastard!_

And then, just as Elphaba thought that the King was about to make yet another jab at Dorothy's self-esteem, a Nome messenger emerged from the wall almost right next to the King's left ear, whispered a few inaudible sentences, and disappeared. **"Your... "Army"... has stopped guessing,"** said the King, somehow managing to pronounce the punctuation around the word "army." **"He is now standing perfectly still in the middle of the room; can you think of any particular reason why he would do this?"**

"His action must have run down," said Dorothy quietly. "I wound up his thought but not his action..."

"**Hmm. Why don't you go in and wind him up?"** the King suggested, though of course he meant it as an order; the door to the staircase was already drawing itself open.** "You can stay with him while he finishes, then guess for yourself."**

So, in complete silence, Dorothy began the long walk towards the door, looking uncannily like a condemned prisoner being led to the gallows. _Not that there's much difference,_ Elphaba thought grimly.

This was going to be the only chance Elphaba had to change things: with teleportation out of the question, the only other option she had was to try to get a message to Dorothy, some way of letting her know how to best the ritual. After all, Elphaba had done her research, and there were loopholes to be found in the substance of this little ceremony. But this still left margins for error in Dorothy's performance, and more to the point, why would Dorothy listen to anything _she_ had to say? And if Basalt were to give her the message, would there be enough time to get her to trust him?

Meanwhile, Dorothy stood at the threshold, peering into the darkness of the staircase. She was about to begin her descent, when the Nome King's voice rang out from behind her: **"Dorothy... you don't **_**have**_** to go down there..."**

As if manoeuvred by a puppeteer, Dorothy slowly turned; there was no hope in her movements now: whatever the King was going to suggest, she knew it couldn't be anything good.

"**I can use the Ruby Slippers to send you home,"** the King whispered. **"You can leave this world behind once again, and when you arrive back in Kansas, you'll never think of Oz again. Think about it: no more dreams, no more sleepless nights, no more therapy, no more troubling visits to terrifying clinics with screaming patients, and no more wishing you could be anywhere but home. Wouldn't you want that? Wouldn't you want that chance at happiness?"**

_What the hell are you doing, old man? Is this your recklessness playing up again, or are you just toying with her for your own sick amusement before you finally get around to killing her?_

"What about my friends?" Dorothy asked.

"**They remain as they are. Forget about them; you can't help them now."**

There was a deathly silence.

"**There's no place like home,"** the King whispered eerily.

At the time, Elphaba didn't know that these had been the words that had sent Dorothy back to Kansas on her last visit to Oz; right then and there, she knew it only as another callous trampling of the girl's morale, a sly nod at all the times she'd spent longing to go back home last year. And it was working, because if Dorothy had looked miserable beforehand, now she just looked _sick._

Without another word (she probably couldn't trust herself to speak without crying), she began her descent, and was instantly obscured- first by the shadows, and then by the closing wall.

And suddenly, Elphaba was in motion; she knew that pinning all her hopes on a traumatized child was a risky gambit, and relying on the Wizard's old tactics hardly made her feel any better about the situation, but at this point, this was her only option.

She didn't expect Dorothy to save the day single-handedly, but if things went as planned, she _might_ just be able to tip the scales in their favour. If nothing else, the girl had luck on her side.

"Basalt," she whispered, "Is the King actually keeping a close eye on that staircase?"

"Not to my knowledge; all his spies are currently watching the ornament collection."

"Then get me to that staircase _now."_

* * *

Dorothy was almost at the bottom of the stairs and dreading every step closer, when she heard the now-familiar sound of a Nome emerging from a nearby wall, and a voice whispering, "Good luck." And then, she heard the sound of footsteps slowly approaching; as far as she could tell, the noise was coming from a doorway directly to her left, masked by a thick curtain- as if the King didn't want her getting too curious and straying off the path.

By now, she'd just about given up on Jack's idea of escaping the palace, because the King no doubt had guards watching her every move, but that didn't stop a chill running across her spine as she heard those footsteps echoing closer... and _closer..._

"Dorothy?" a female voice whispered.

"Who's there?" she whispered back.

The footsteps suddenly stopped, and the curtain billowed, as if somebody had just brushed against it. From behind the thick velvet drapes, the voice said, "Don't worry; I'm here to help. It might not be much comfort considering we haven't got much time before the King finds me, but I'm here to help, that's the main thing."

Dorothy eyed the shape behind the curtain dubiously; whoever this person was, there was something inexplicably familiar about her voice. "Do I know you?" she asked.

"We've met," the woman answered vaguely. "Who I am isn't important right now; this isn't the time for unpleasant surprises- the less noise we make, the more time we have before the King realises that something's up."

"Unpleasant surprises? What do you mean by that?"

"For Oz's sake, girl, would you shut up and listen for just a few seconds?" the woman snapped irritably. "Now, you know that the game is rigged in the Nome King's favour, of course; however, you still have at least four chances to win."

"What good will that do?" said Dorothy wearily. "What makes me any likelier to find the Scarecrow than Jack or the Gump? You said yourself- the King has everything rigged in his favour!"

"Not _literally_ everything: it'd take too long to explain precisely what the King's doing and why, but the point is that this death-trap he's sending you towards works exactly like a game; he has to give you a chance of winning in order for it to work, even if the odds are stacked against you. Your friends won't have been transformed into objects at random; there'll be ways of recognizing which objects are the victims."

"Like what?" In spite of herself, Dorothy was now feeling ever-so-slightly hopeful.

"All them will be similar in some way: they'll be the same size, the same kind of object, made of the same material, something like that. And knowing the King, he'll have picked something appropriate to each victim. All you've got to do is study the objects and think carefully before you guess. Okay?"

The tiny spark of hope died.

"Can't you come with me?" Dorothy whispered, well aware of just how pathetic she sounded.

"No: the room's being watched by the King's spies; the moment I get in there, he'll have me captured. I'm sorry, but it's up to you and Tik-Tok to finish the game."

"What happens if I lose?"

There was a pause. "Well, you'll die," said the voice, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "Your body will be transformed into an ornament, and the King will devour the rest."

Dorothy smiled sadly. "It's not as if I don't deserve it."

"_What?"_

"Everything that's happened is my fault, isn't it? I let the Ruby Slippers fall off on the way home, and the Nome King caught them; everything that's happened to Oz is my fault- if I'd tried to keep the Slippers on my feet, I might have..." She shook her head; tears were blurring her eyesight again. The more she retraced her steps through her memories, the more wounds she found herself ripping open. She tried to speak slowly, but guilt and self-reproach were already eroding her composure, and she found herself speaking faster and faster until she could barely understand what she was saying "It's further than that though, isn't it? If I'd just given the Witch the Slippers, none of this would have happened either; if I hadn't taken the Slippers in the first place if I'd just kept my hands to myself if I'd never come to Oz in the first place everyone would still be alive even the Witch and her sister because I good as killed them I'm a murderer _and I deserve this I deserve this I deserve thi-"_

The curtain hissed aside, and before she could get a decent look at the woman standing behind it, Dorothy felt the stranger's arms gently wrap themselves around her; instantly, she fell silent, even her tears suddenly dwindling to a halt. Blinking in surprise, she looked up, trying to get a good look at the woman who was now hugging her, but in the dim light of the stairwell, it was almost impossible to discern features among the shadows; however, just visible overhead was the brim of an inexplicably familiar-looking hat...

"You didn't know that the King was going to catch the Ruby Slippers," said the voice gently. "You didn't know what he was going to do with them, and you sure as hell didn't tell him to invade Oz; you can't be blamed for what happened to Oz, and you don't deserve what's happened to you- and you can't let the Nome King convince you otherwise."

"But I took the Slippers in the first place, I-"

"You were a kid," the voice sighed. "Kids make stupid decisions all the time- and being lost in another world, I hardly think you'd be starved for stupid choices to make. And you aren't a murderer; I know who sent the tornado, and I know for a fact it wasn't you."

"But I threw the bucket of water-"

The stranger audibly stifled a laugh. It could have been Dorothy's imagination, but there was something oddly familiar about the sudden burst of muffled cackling she'd heard.

"What's so funny?"

"It doesn't matter," said the voice, sobering rapidly. "My point is, you can't blame yourself for what happened; even I can't blame you, and for the longest time, I hated you for what had happened between us. It took me quite a while to figure out that you were just being manipulated by the Wizard. But some things never change: now the Nome King's trying to manipulate you into getting what _he_ wants out of the Ruby Slippers... and you're the only one who can tip the balance out of his favour. You've been very brave thus far- braver than I ever thought you could be; this will all be over soon, one way or the other, and all you need to do is be brave just a _little_ longer-"

There was a sharp intake of breath from somewhere nearby, and Dorothy felt something roughly shove her out of the stranger's arms. **"**_**I do not appreciate interference,**_**"** hissed the Nome King, his voice tipped with newfound venom.

"Goodbye, Dorothy," the voice whispered hurriedly. "Don't forget about the-"

There was a flash of vivid orange light, and the stairwell was plunged into silence once again. Then, at long last, the lights glowed brighter, and Dorothy saw her ally's face for the first time.

At first, the only thing recognizable about the woman was the fact that she'd been transformed into a statue much like the citizens of the Emerald City; but as Dorothy looked closer, she recognized both the hat _and_ the face- and even though the colour of her skin was impossible to tell now that it was granite, there was no mistaking the familiar features of the Wicked Witch of the West.

It all made sense, now: the familiar voice, the familiar laugh, the glimpse of the hat, the remark about unpleasant surprises, the talk of her having hated Dorothy... in fact, only one question remained:

"W... why?" Dorothy asked nobody in particular. "Why did you help me?"

Naturally, the Witch could not reply.

"Who are you? Really, who _are_ you? A year ago, I thought you wanted to kill me; a few minutes ago, you _hugged_ me. _Who are you?_ How are you even here? I thought you were dead- did that even happen at all?"

_Maybe Aunt Em was right,_ Dorothy thought. _Maybe I really am going crazy._

"Did I ever know anything about you in the first place?" she wondered aloud. It didn't seem to be the case, whatever way she looked at it: as far as she could remember, she'd never asked any questions about the Witch on her first visit to Oz, and nobody had ever really told her anything about her except rumours and tall tales. She'd never heard anything about what the Witch was really like under all the rage and all the hatred; she'd never heard what the Witch's life had been like, or if she'd been any different before becoming a witch in the first place.

She'd never even thought to ask- she'd been too busy worrying about how to get home. And she'd probably never get the chance again, all things considered.

Dorothy took a deep breath, and- trying to muffle the constant flow of questions rushing through her mind- began to descend the stairs. At the last minute, she turned back towards the petrified witch, feeling a much-justified desire to say goodbye- only to realise that she didn't know the witch's name. In fact, _nobody_ had known her name, at least as far as Dorothy could remember.

And somehow, despite all the saddening things she'd seen in the last few days, this single fact was the most sorrowful and lonely thing she'd ever heard.

She sighed; she couldn't stand here forever. The Witch had made it this far and willingly faced petrifaction just to give her the clues for winning the King's game; Dorothy had to make sure the sacrifice wasn't for nothing. So, taking a deep breath to steel herself, she slowly continued down the stairs towards the ornament collection.

_One step closer to the Scarecrow,_ she thought. _One step closer to understanding the Witch._

* * *

A/N: Next chapter- Dorothy Gale makes her three guesses, and the Nome King begins the final destruction of Oz...

PS- I'm currently recovering from the earth-shattering stupid concept of the film "Oz: The Great and the Powerful." For those of you who haven't checked the synopsis, it's essentially another prequal to the Wizard of Oz- except this time, for reasons best known to the Hollywood cocaine bucket, it has the Wizard as the hero. Now, on the face of it, I haven't got a problem with this film: tricksters and other morally-ambigous heroes are always fun, as Moist Von Lipwig demonstrates.

However, the synopsis includes the words "Putting his magical arts to use through illusion, ingenuity—and even a bit of wizardry—Oscar transforms himself not only into the great and powerful Wizard of Oz but into a better man as well."

ARE YOU _KIDDING_ ME? Seriously? Even if you haven't actually seen _Wicked_ (though I'd wonder why you're reading this story if that's the case), there's no way you can possibly spin the Wizard as a straight-up morally-unabiguous squeaky-clean hero; he's the trope namer for The Man Behind The Curtain, for Christ's sake! He's a dictator, he's a fraud, he's a con artist- and this is just in the film and book! How in the name of buggery can you retcon all of that? Really, how?

I had to explain that, if only to stop it from cropping up all over the story- though given some of Javelin's harsher insults, I can't say I was entirely successful.


	33. The Shattering of Oz

A/N: The latest chapter, ladies and gents! Sorry it's late, but once again, events have once again ended up swamping me. With any luck, I'll be able to polish off the next chapters sooner than before.

I'd like to thank everyone who's reviewed and favourited this story in the last month or so- it's always great to hear your opinions and I'm glad you're happy with the way things are going so far; I can only hope I continue to meet and exceed expectations.

So, without further ado: another twisted metamorphosis ocurrs, the Nome King unknowingly quotes Team Fortress 2, and Dorothy makes her fateful guesses. Read, review, and above all, enjoy!

Disclaimer: Wicked, Return to Oz, and Oz itself do not, cannot, and will not belong to me.

* * *

The moment she entered the ornament chamber, Dorothy knew she was dead.

In all her life, she'd never seen so many precious objects; even Doctor Worley's luxurious office hadn't been this richly adorned. Looking around at all the gold, silver, gemstones, marble, lacquered wood and porcelain around her, she knew that there'd be no chance of ever guessing correctly- even with the advice that the Witch had given her.

There had to be hundreds of objects here, maybe thousands; how was she supposed to guess at the right one? How was she supposed to guess at a pattern among the clutter? There were so many different kinds of ornaments clustered across the tables and shelves that it was just about impossible to imagine any kind of link between _any _of them. And apart from using it to hide the Scarecrow, why had the King bothered to collect all this stuff, and where had he found it, anyway? Had these ornaments been made for him by his subjects? Had they been stolen from Oz during the invasions? Or- her eyes widened with sudden horror- what if this wasn't the first time the King had played this "little game?" What if all these treasures had once been living people, now permanently transformed?

She took a deep breath. She couldn't start panicking now, and she certainly couldn't start guessing at the answer to every single question that popped into her head. She had three very important guesses to make, and she had to make them with a clear head... and she also had to find Tik-Tok. All she had to do in the meantime was to stay calm and try not to listen for the muffled wailing of tormented souls...

After a minute of wandering the ornament collection and growing all the more apprehensive with every step she took, Dorothy finally found him; as the King had said, he was standing motionless in the very centre of the room, right arm outstretched towards a small gold figurine on a table in front of him. However, as she hastened to his side, she quickly noticed that, even though Tik-Tok remained completely motionless, his action works were still turning.

Dorothy was halfway through asking what was wrong, when Tik-Tok suddenly spoke in a voice so low that even Dorothy's fear-sharpened hearing barely discerned it. "Shhh," he intoned softly. "It-Was-My-Way-Of-Getting-You-In-Here. Pretend-You-Are-Winding-Me-Up; I-Have-An-Idea-That-May-Very-Well-Save-Us."

Pausing only to glance over her shoulder to check for the Nomes that were probably watching her every move, Dorothy went about pretending to turn handle #3 as Tik-Tok explained: "The-King-Wanted-To-Make-Sure-We-Would-Not-Know-What-The-Others-Transformed-Into; So-I-Made-Sure-You-Would-See. I-Have-One-Guess-Left. If-I-Guess-Incorrectly, You-Can-Watch-And-See-What-I-Am-Changed-Into. That-Way-We-Have-Another-Chance-At-Guessing-And-Perhaps-A-Clue-As-To-How-This-"Game"-Works."

"That's brilliant!" Dorothy hissed, just managing to stop herself from jumping for joy.

There was a deathly pause, as Tik-Tok's gaze swung from ornament to ornament, as if he was trying to decide which to guess at. Finally, the clockwork Army spoke again, and for the first time since she'd met him, Dorothy heard his usual monotone waver. "I... My-Steel-Brains-Must-Have-Been-Damaged-In-The-Crash; I-Am-Having-Difficulty-Guessing. I-Try-To-Guess-At-A-Pattern, But-No-Pattern-Emerges. I-Am-Sorry-I-Did-Not-Think-Of-This-Solution-Earlier, When-I-Still-Had-"

"It's okay. You did the best you could, Tik-Tok."

Hugging her only surviving friend goodbye, Dorothy heard the sound of liquid dripping on metal, and looked up to see that- impossibly- a single tear of emerald-tinted oil was trickling from Tik-Tok's right eye and dripping loudly against his hollow metal torso. As she gently wiped the oil away with a handkerchief, Dorothy briefly wondered how a machine could cry. Then she thought back to the sight of the Wicked Witch, petrified for trying to help her through the King's game; perhaps this was much the same thing- another glimpse of something unexpected beneath the surface of someone she thought she'd understood perfectly.

Meanwhile, Tik-Tok was staring at the green oil smudged on Dorothy's handkerchief. "I-Will-Be-Alright," he said softly. "I-Am-Only-A-Machine; I-Cannot-Suffer, Nor-Can-I-Feel-Sorrow... No-Matter-What-Happens."

And somehow, though he'd said similar things before, now it sounded more like a sad, half-hearted joke than anything else.

Then he began the slow, plodding march towards his ornament of choice: a tiny silver goblet sitting on the edge of a table crowded with dozens of other objects. Dorothy carefully examined all the items on the table, committing all of them to memory so that she'd recognize any new arrivals when Tik-Tok was transformed. Meanwhile, Tik-Tok himself stopped within arm's reach of the object; for a moment, he hesitated, then briefly turned back towards Dorothy. "Ready?" he asked.

Dorothy nodded.

Tik-Tok's hand slowly descended on the goblet, and as his metal fingers tightened around its rim, he said the fateful words: "Oz!"

And with a crash of thunder, the lights went out, plunging the room into stygian darkness.

When they finally flickered back on, Tik-Tok was nowhere to be seen.

Hurrying over towards the table, Dorothy frantically studied it for any sign of new items. But no, nothing had changed: the goblet, the porcelain rams, the bone china dishes, the golden ashtrays- all of them had been here on the table when the choice had been made. In the few seconds of darkness, Tik-Tok had not only been transformed, but transferred to one of a hundred different tables, shelves, benches, or desks spread out across the room.

Once again, the game was rigged in the King's favour from beginning to end: Tik-Tok's last desperate gambit had been for nothing, and Dorothy was no closer to knowing how to save him, the Scarecrow, or any of her other friends.

_And now it's my turn to guess..._

* * *

Upstairs, something not entirely human leaned back on his throne and smiled, enjoying the sensation of muscles shifting under his new face.

"Dorothy Gale," he murmured softly. _"You're all that's left."_

Once upon a time, this entity had once been known by a multitude of names: the Nome King, Roquat the Red, the Mountain That Speaks, the Quaking of the Earth, the Upstart Librarian, and- at one stage of his life that was best left forgotten- the Senile Old Coprolite. But now, in truth, though he was still King Roquat in many ways, there was no name for what he was: the shape he now wore, neither human nor Nome, was testament to that.

For a time, he admired himself in the mirrors that now floated around him, appraising the current stage of transformation he had reached. For all intents and purposes, he was almost completely human by now: the rough crags had softened into permeable human skin, as smooth and polished as marble; the crude projections of rock jutting from his chin and from the top of his head had divided and thinned into hair- somewhat reminiscent of steel wool, but hair nonetheless.

Ironically, the only hint as to his true nature was in his newly-grown skin and hair: both were a dull concrete-grey in colour. He didn't mind it; for the moment, it gave him something of a distinguished appearance. Besides, once he was human and he'd completely assimilated the power of the Ruby Slippers, he could take on whatever form he wished, human or inhuman. With reality as mutable as clay before his power, literally anything was possible: no doubt a more fitting shape would be called for after his ascension was complete- perhaps a humanoid body composed entirely of stars, with arms formed from constellations and nebulae, with two blazing supernovae for eyes; perhaps a stone leviathan of endlessly coiling tentacles, like the deep-sea octopus that had so often captured his imagination on his brief forays into the ocean; perhaps a vast stormcloud, perhaps a flock of dragons- anything was possible!

The Nome King (though he could no longer be truly called a Nome) sighed; it was such a shame that Elphaba had to be petrified, even if she had decided to interfere in such an honestly foolish manner. True, it was borne of the same defiance that the King admired so, but there was honestly no excusing such recklessness. In fact, the more he thought about it, the more he had to wonder if her sanity had escaped the last few days intact: the desperation, the referring to things that had never happened, the furious outbursts- perhaps Elphaba had begun to buckle under constant strain. In any event, leniency would be called for once the transformation was over and done with, of course; restoration, and a reward for her part in creating the source of his victory. She'd probably complain and drivel on about how she didn't deserve another chance at life, but then, could a mortal be expected to be an accurate judge of their worth? The King understood Elphaba's worth, and he also knew how to reward it, for he was nothing if not a just and magnanimous god.

And speaking of godhood...

The entity that had once been known as Roquat the Red now turned his gaze away from the palace and let his mind soar out across the plateau, leaving his body seated placidly on his throne. Having had several thousand years of experience in travelling through the earth in a fairly similar matter, he found this newfound skill relatively easy to master; what truly amazed him was the way he now perceived the world as he ascended from the earth. His developing humanity and the flow of purified magic into his body had evidently worked some impossible alchemy upon his senses, for he couldn't recall ever seeing the surface world with such vibrancy before today.

To his ethereal sight, the sky was a vivid luminescent blue, dotted with tiny specks of dazzling white that experience told him were probably clouds; the sun was an incandescent ball of flame that shone so brightly and projected such warmth that Roquat felt as if he could reach out and touch it. Stagnant pools across the earth beneath him reflected the sun, transforming the normally dull exterior of the plateau into an assemblage of gleaming mirrors. In the distance, the sands of the Deadly Desert danced a haunting ballet in a sudden gust of wind, sweeping to and fro across the rolling dunes in near-hypnotic patterns. And oh, how the forests of distant Oz seemed emerald to his mind's eye!

But that was nothing compared to how the world around him reacted to his powers as he began to slowly stretch his metaphysical muscles: first, the clouds overhead began to whirl and twist into maelstroms, before hastily turning to follow his path across the sky. Then, far below him, the few pockets of putrid organic matter that had managed to find a toehold on the barren plains- the moulds, the lichens, the insects, and the occasional nesting bird- abruptly smouldered and disintegrated as the King's thoughts swept across them. And then the plateau itself began to change and flatten, the rare pinnacles and mesas lowering themselves into the earth, caverns and crevasses sealing themselves shut; even the very stone that composed the surface began to change, the rough granite growing steadily paler and smoother. In the space of a few seconds, the surface of the plateau, from the border to the foothills of the mountain, had transformed into a featureless expanse of polished marble.

Beneath its gleaming white exterior, discombobulated Nomes could only gape and wonder at what could have possibly caused this. Several hundred feet above it, the King could only smile down at his handiwork, and wonder what he would do next.

Then, out of the corner of his mind's eye, he saw a tiny flicker of motion right at the border between the plateau and the Deadly Desert; there, a small cluster of gaudily-dressed Nomes were engaged in a heated conversation with a small army of distressed-looking Nome warriors. Looking closer, he saw familiar faces beneath the gold filigree and bejewelled carapaces, faces that conjured memories of hatred and humiliation.

The ethereal smile took on a savage edge, and with another flicker of thought, something not entirely human began the descent towards the waiting generals of the War Council.

* * *

It had taken them days to make it this far: one bureaucrat after another had delayed their approach, bogging them down in paperwork for every mile they travelled- forms on recovering lost equipment from the front, "spoils of war" claims from warriors registering goods looted from Oz, contracts from Nome businessman requesting use of the new territory, requests from border patrols wanting to know what to do with captured Ozian refugees, complaints from every corner of the dominions- on and on and _on..._

And worst of all, up until recently, most of it seemed completely legitimate. It wasn't until they'd noticed that literally every single general had received some variation on the same red tape that they'd realized that they were being deliberately sabotaged. More specifically, the drooling lunatic they'd mistaken for a pliable figurehead had gone out of his way to prove that he should never have been left alone with the reins of power. Of course, none of them knew what he was planning or why it required them being delayed for so long, nor did they want to know. In fact, most weren't in the mood to even think about it- they were too busy imagining the rock-crusher they were going to slowly feed him to once they arrived back at the palace.

So, with the assembled council within a few minutes of settling this issue once and for all, they were naturally annoyed at being held up by a border patrol: in fact, the only thing keeping them from simply obliterating all five patrolmen on the spot was the Chairman's plan to investigate the situation before attacking the palace.

And then, no sooner had the questioning begun when the familiar sound of grinding rock filled the air, only amplified a thousandfold. As one, they looked up to see the plateau slowly transforming, the familiar crags and mesas disappearing from view; for a time, the watching generals could only stare in silence as the impossible transformation played out before them. Then the panic whispers began spread across the crowd, both generals and bodyguards suddenly consumed by speculation as to what might have just caused what they'd just seen. It took several blasts of thunderous noise from the Chairman to silence the mob, and the only reason they listened at all was because a few of them had happened to glance in the direction that he was pointing.

Far above them, a dark red stain was slowly spreading across the azure sky.

Much nearer- less than a hundred feet away from the War Council, in fact- something shadowy and wraithlike descended from the blood-coloured clouds to stand before them on crooked, claw-like feet. Cloaked in an ethereal grey shroud, it towered above the Chairman by a good ten feet, its impossibly long arms stretching wide enough to block any further move ahead by the Council. The entity's translucent features were obscured by random flushes of energy that coruscated up and down its spindly body, but as they looked closer, there was no mistaking the familiar face of the current Nome King. And then, as the stunned Council tried to digest this particular revelation, the creature's appearance began to change, the details of its face shifting and restructuring itself. But when the transformation finally ended, the face that stared back at them was no less recognizable and no less horrifying- for the face that stared back at them from beneath the haze of magical power could not have belonged to any living Nome.

**GENTLEMEN...**

There was no sound; the voice of the apparition was projected directly into their minds, where it sliced agonizingly into their thoughts and sunk deep into the fabric of their brains.

"Who are you?" the Chairman demanded. _"What_ are you?"

**NOW I AM UNMASKED, YOU KNOW ME WELL ENOUGH, OH WISE AND TRUSTED ADVISORS, **the creature answered, every word a nail being slowly hammered into the minds of all in earshot.** IF YOU COULD ONLY SEE YOURSELVES AS I SEE YOU NOW... IT WOULD BE A MOST ENLIGHTENING EXPERIENCE FOR ALL OF YOU.**

"What is the meaning of this?" one of the younger generals snapped, somehow oblivious to the fact that the Chairman was now beating a hasty retreat back through the crowd. "Who _are _you? What do you want?"

**I **_**WAS**_** ONCE YOUR FIGUREHEAD, YOUR MASCOT, YOUR INFERIOR. NOW, I AM AS I WAS BEFORE YOU STOLE WHAT WAS RIGHTFULLY MINE: I AM ROQUAT THE RED, KING OF NOMEKIND; I AM THE QUAKING OF THE EARTH AND THE THUNDER ON THE MOUNTAINTOP; I AM THE GUIDING VOICE IN THE SHADOWS, AND I AM THE CERTAINTY IN THE DARKNESS; I AM THE BEATING HEART OF THIS KINGDOM AND OF ALL WORLDS THAT EXIST BENEATH THE EARTH; AND TODAY, ABOVE ALL THINGS, I AM **_**VENGEANCE INCARNATE.**_

Lightning tore through the crowd, shattering four generals (along with two bodyguards, nine personal attendants and the council's stenographer) into featureless rubble. There was a long silence, as the gravel that had once been sixteen different Nomes trickled loudly to the ground. Then, the order to retreat sounded; after almost two millennia of field experience, the Chairman knew a losing battle when he saw it. Within the next three seconds, both generals and bodyguards alike were retreating into the earth.

But instead of finding themselves safely underground, they found themselves back on the surface; alarmed, they naturally tried again, to no avail: every time they lowered themselves beneath the rock, they found themselves back on the surface- not as if someone had simply dragged them back there, but as if someone had replicated the entire surface world under the ground. Worse still, none of them were any closer to actually escaping the spectral figure that was still advancing on them.

**THERE'S NOWHERE TO GO, MY LORDS,** he said calmly. **AND I DO MEAN THAT LITERALLY.**

"This is not possible," the Chairman hissed. "This must be an illusion of some kind-"

Without warning, the general standing to his right let out an ear-splitting howl of agony: before the horrified eyes of the council, his body began to slowly change, the stone that composed his body turning pale and transparent, until the surrounding generals could literally see right through him. For the next five seconds, the glass statue that had once been a Nome stood in paralysis, his spirit trapped within his crippled body. Then the earth beneath him opened into two colossal jaws and slammed shut on top of him, shattering him into a thousand pieces.

**DID THAT SEEM PARTICULARLY ILLUSORY TO YOU?**

Nobody answered: they were too busy running for their lives; with their most traditional escape route blocked, they were forced to literally take to their heels and run- once again to no avail. Lightning split the air once again, shattering the fleeing ranks ofgenerals and bodyguards even further. More still underwent hideous transformations as Roquat's magic swept across them, their bodies dissolving into swarms of maggots and cockroaches in mid-stride; others found themselves rooted in place by vines and creepers that surged up _through_ their bodies, slowly tearing them to pieces; more still simply collapsed into ashes- only to be swept up by gale-force winds and flung headlong across the Nome Dominions. Out of sheer desperation, a few of the generals stood their ground and bombarded Roquat's spectral body with powerful battle-spells; if the onslaught had any effect on him, the King certainly didn't show it, and the resistance was smothered almost instantly in a rising tide of destruction and transformation.

In the chaos that had followed the first execution, the Chairman had managed to make it as far as the Deadly Desert before the King's power caught up with him: it froze him in place just as surely as the vitrification or the creepers had brought the other generals to a halt; unlike the others, though, there was no obvious source to his paralysis at first. All that happened was that he found himself unable to move. He felt pressure against his body, growing steadily greater until it felt as though he was pinned to the ground by the weight of a mountain. For a moment, he thought that Roquat was using gravity against him, trying to crush him to death; but then- with great difficulty- he looked down at his hands, and realised the truth.

Somehow, his hands- and most of his body, by now- had flattened; every single feature, from his diamond-studded fingers to the statuary clustered upon his back, was now as thin and weightless as paper. Somehow, in the space of less than fifteen seconds, he'd lost an entire dimension.

Horror-stricken, he looked up at the monstrous figure that the former Nome King had somehow become. "It wasn't my intention to do what was done," he pleaded. "You have to believe me."

**I'VE SEEN THE RECORDS OF THE MEETING THAT DECIDED MY FATE. THE DECISION WAS MADE UNANIMOUSLY... SO TECHNICALLY IT WASN'T YOUR INTENTION **_**ALONE**_**. I SEE THE JOKE.**

"It wasn't a joke, Your Majesty... please, forgive me... I... I only intended the best for the Kingdom."

**DON'T WE ALL. VERY WELL THEN, RESHERENKOR; IF YOU WANT FORGIVENESS, I SHALL GRANT IT: WE SHALL SPEAK NO MORE OF PAST GRIEVANCES. AS FAR AS I'M CONCERNED, EVERYTHING YOU DID TO ME IS JUST A STORY, NEVER TO BE TOLD AGAIN... A LONG-FORGOTTEN BOOK THAT NO LIVING SOUL WILL EVER READ...**

Suddenly, the pressure increased, and this time it wasn't a simple feeling of being immobilized or flattened: this time, the Chairman felt himself being pressed _against _something that felt uncannily like paper, and the air was filled with a sound of hundreds of pens scratching against the paper around him. There was no pain, but as the pressure grew, so did a distinct feeling of loss. Again and again, he felt himself being pressed onto paper, felt himself becoming a little more ephemeral, and heard the noise of scribbling growing louder and louder until it drowned out the world around him; he tried to scream, but no sound emerged, and he could no longer move his jaws anyway. What had the King done to him? And what was happening to his body? To his senses, it no longer felt like the gold and platinum form he usually inhabited; it didn't even feel like stone.

And then, just as suddenly as it had started, the noise and the pressure abruptly stopped, plunging the world into an unnatural silence. He tried to move again, but his limbs refused to budge. Moments later, a shape not unlike the lid of a coffin filled the air above him; with his senses so distorted, it took the Chairman some time to realize that it was actually the opposite half of a vast book, seen as though he was standing right in the middle of it. The page across from him was made of fine vellum, and covered with delicately handwritten words and carefully-sketched drawings of places that the Chairman recognized from his distant past.

Curious, he looked closer at the words of the book. It took him several seconds of reading to work out what any of it meant, and by that time, the pages of the book had begun to close:

_And had he been able to scream,_ the pages read,_ he would have howled and wailed and sobbed with all his might; for he knew that he was beyond hope. He was not standing between the pages of a book: he was printed on every single page of that book, never to escape._

* * *

Roquat left the book within the ruins of the Emerald City, upon the broken shelves of a library that had long since collapsed into rubble. A fitting end to the Chairman's dreary story, he thought.

So now the War Council was dead; their influence over the Nome Dominions was gone.

But why did he feel so... gloomy?

Why did he feel as though he'd forgotten something, even now that he'd accomplished what he'd set out to do?

Was there something else to do?

_Of course_, he thought. _There's always more to do, especially once the few boundaries on my power are gone... and perhaps it's time to test those boundaries while they're still here._

His mind's eye tilted downwards, and very slowly, the densely-forested Land of Oz crept into view. He couldn't remember_ exactly_ what he'd originally intended to do to that hateful little patch of land, but he knew that he'd wanted to make an example of it.

_Always more to be done,_ he thought, _Always things that could be better..._

* * *

That midmorning, the skies over Oz- and _only_ over Oz- turned as black as night, and a full moon cast a sickly yellowish glow upon a landscape that had lost all sense of reality.

Already transformed almost beyond recognition by the vast reforestation it had undergone in the last few days, the land underwent its own horrific transformation once again; this time, the earth itself turned molten, rising, falling and warping out of shape as the rising tide of magic flowed across it. From Muchkinland to the Vinkus, trees become bent and crooked as the thaumaturgical current washed over them, their leaves sprouting barbed thorns, their branches suddenly bearing weirdly misshapen grey fruit- deadly poisonous, as the witnesses soon discovered. Other trees were simply uprooted altogether by the passing energies, disintegrated into twisted black vines that coated the ground- or anyone unlucky enough to be standing nearby.

Beneath those trees, hills rose and fell like bread dough in some colossal oven; newborn mountains tore through the landscape to cast new shadows upon the terrified Ozians that watched. Valleys opened into canyons and crevasses, sending ruined buildings plummeting into the void and killing any survivors desperate enough to be hiding within. In the sky, luminescent clouds rained centipedes, spiders, and all manner of poisonous arthropods- along with a viscous black fluid that stank of raw sewage and induced spontaneous vomiting on skin contact- upon an unsuspecting populace.

In the north of Oz, the ground crackled open, drawing a deep fissure from the Deadly Desert to the Emerald City; and from the depths of the earth, a river of boiling blood emerged. Slowly, it grew- never enough to become an ocean or a lake, but just enough to contaminate the streams that the survivors relied upon for fresh water.

Not too far away from the blossoming river of blood, a small mining settlement was inexplicably bombarded with meteors, the buildings reduced to ashes and the very soil they'd been built upon transmuted into solid granite. Those survivors who'd escaped the fires wondered aloud why anyone would want to attack such a quaint little town; what good could destroying it possibly do? What worth was it to the enemy? The only thing this place had ever produced was a few miners who'd been lucky enough to strike it rich and find the Emeralds that went on to decorate the Emerald City.

In the forgotten laboratories on the border between the Munchkinland and Quadling Country, where the Wizard's specialists had once tried to silence Animals for good, a few survivors happened to seek shelter. And as the magic swept across them, the boundary between human and Animal was almost completely lost: human survivors manifested cloven hooves, tails, and fur; Animal survivors took on hairless skin and five-toed feet. Nobody could tell if this was an illusion, or if they really had transformed; shock had taken their last reserves of rational thought. The most they could do was sit in disbelief as their transformations continued, or-, in the case of the more openly anti-Animal among them- slither away on half-grown tails, weeping piteously.

At Shiz University, students taking refuge in the library- one of the few campus buildings to survive the last few days intact- gathered at the window to see the ruined lecture halls and gutted classrooms slowly reforming. Rubble vanished from the lawn, reassembling itself into brick walls and stone steps; glass formed again in the smashed windowpanes; statues were settled back on their pedestals; even the ivy that had once grown so thickly on the buildings reappeared, just as thick as it had been before the Nomes had torn it down. For a moment, they marvelled at their luck: then, they looked up and noticed the great glass ceiling slowly descending upon them; a bell jar in which the restored campus and its ghosts could be preserved for all time.

Then the ghostly students and professors began the slow march towards the buildings, ready to re-enact their first day once again, and a familiar song filled the air:

_Oh hallowed halls and vine-draped walls..._

And several hundred miles to the southeast, the surviving bombardiers could only watch as the world outside the Governor's mansion slowly began to tear itself apart: the ground itself cracked open, dividing into individual islands of land floating above a bottomless abyss; for several minutes, these islands floated above the endless night below, before they finally broke apart and sank noiselessly into the depths. From his position at the window, Gnoll swore he could see stars glittering ominously in that terrible void, along with the fading ruins of things unlucky enough to have fallen in- houses, trees, animals... once, he swore he could see the flailing shape of a man tumbling through the emptiness, but he couldn't bear to look any closer.

Logically, the bombardiers should have been panicking; after all, they were poised on the edge of oblivion and watching the rest of the world sliding towards it. But for some reason, they'd been spared: the mansion was protected (and caged) by an enormous glass tank. The ground beneath it refused to collapse: they'd been spared from the apocalypse that was slowly consuming the outside world. Of course, none of them felt particularly happy about it: after all, how much food and water was left in the mansion? How long would the air inside the tank last? And how long would it take for them to suffocate once the last lungful of air was spent?

None of them could bear to answer these questions; it wasn't as if anything could be done. So, with nothing else to do except share the last of the wine racks, they sat there in the darkness, and waited for the end.

* * *

Somewhere not too far from Roquat's body, there was a rumble of thunder- just loud enough to get his attention, even though said attention was currently hovering somewhere between Munchkinland and the ruins of the Emerald City. He didn't even discern his spirit's journey across the disappearing land; one moment he was soaring over the ruins of Oz, finally allowing his metaphysical muscles to relax- the next, he was back in his almost-human body, sitting on his throne and waiting for Dorothy to finish guessing.

But Dorothy had only just finished her first guess, and the reports of the Nome Dominion's transformation were only just trickling in; a quick glance at the palace's chronometer revealed that he'd been away for less than four and a half minutes. And yet he remembered so much more than that- at least an hour of carnage and deconstruction.

_I compressed time _by accident_ and I haven't even unlocked the full potential of the Ruby Slippers,_ he marvelled silently.

There was a polite cough to his left, and he looked up to see the butler hovering patiently by the wall: "Princess Mombi has arrived via the Forgotten Road, and is now requesting an audience with you, Your Majesty; she says it is urgent."

_Well, this leaves us with two options: she's either only just discovered that Dorothy's escaped, or she's seen what's happened to the rest of Oz. Either way, she's panicked and abandoned her post. Of all the things I could have done to pass the time before I finally ascend, this is has got to be among the most futile. Oh well, the sooner I speak to her, the sooner I can get rid of her._

"Send her in."

* * *

It had taken Mombi far longer than necessary to get here, even with the wheels of her chariot all but blazing with enhancement spells and the Wheelers whipped to within an inch of their pathetic little lives.

Normally, she would have balked at having to ride the damn thing ever again after her last attempt to seize Ozian territory, but desperate times called for desperate measures: the moment the Wheelers had returned from the chase empty handed (or empty-wheeled, perhaps), she'd known that the Nome King would have to be warned about the fact that Dorothy Gale was approaching his palace with a chicken in tow. Right now, she didn't care if the prospects of a reward were virtually zero, that she'd gotten within inches of a full-blown chariot-crash, that her Wheelers might die from overexertion, or that she'd be punished for letting a prisoner escape; if a chicken got loose in the palace, there'd be hell to pay. If the damn thing actually ended up laying an egg, if someone got hurt- and that somebody was the King- nothing in the world could possibly save her.

But at last, she was here; the King could now be warned, and her ass would most assuredly remain out of the bonfire for the moment.

Then the doors to the audience chambers rumbled open, and Mombi's optimism suddenly evaporated as she saw the creature that was sitting on the King's throne. It looked _vaguely_ like the King- there was no mistaking the distinctive shape to the face and the beard- but it now looked more human than Nome. Not that you could mistake this _thing_ for a human: its movements were two fluid, its skin too malleable. And the atmosphere around it was flooded with magical energies of a kind that Mombi had never seen before- too potent and much too rarefied to belong to anything human... or Nome for that matter. And gods help her, she was still walking towards it.

Less than eight feet from the monster's throne, the creature looked up at her with a gaze that seemed to dissect her on the spot. Then, it murmured, "Kneel."

Mombi recognized the Nome King's voice, but it had lost its mountainous bass; now, it sounded almost human- and somehow all the more unnerving. Then, as she wondered what could have possibly caused this transformation, she realised she'd been given an order, and hastily lowered herself to her knees.

"_Lower,"_ said the King.

All pride forgotten, Mombi lowered herself even further, doing her very best not to make eye contact as she flattened herself against the floor.

"**LOWER!"** the King bellowed, voice as suddenly as thunderous as it had been when he was still a Nome- but now echoing and distorted and somehow... _wrong_. And unless she was surely mistaken, there was a sound not unlike the crash of thunder in the distance.

As the mind-pummelling sound washed over her, Mombi flinched and instinctively tried to duck lower still- only to accidentally bump her head on the marble floor. For almost a whole minute, she lay there, cowering as the Nome King's laughter echoed wildly about the chamber. Then, she finally remembered why she was there in the first place: "Dorothy Gale has returned!" she said urgently.

"Yes, I know. As I recall, you were supposed to bring her to me."

But Mombi wasn't in the mood to be deterred at this point. "She escaped from custody," she said loudly, awkwardly clambering to her feet. "She stole my key, my Powder of Life, _and_ a number of extremely valuable antiques- which she made a flying escape vehicle out of, incidentally- and she's headed this way with a..."

There was an embarrassed pause, as she finally dared to let her eyes stray to the King's face. He didn't look angry; he didn't even look especially troubled: if anything, he looked almost amused- his right eyebrow raised in a quizzical expression, his lips twitching towards a smirk as he went on puffing his pipe. For a moment, Mombi could only stand there, gaping in horror. "You _know,"_ she whispered at last.

"Oh, I know _everything,"_ said the King smugly. "She's already here... but not for much longer."

* * *

She had one guess left.

Dorothy had _tried_ to look for the patterns that the Witch had told her about; there were simply too many objects to recognize any of the options that had been offered. But she'd persevered; remembering how the Witch had suggested that each object might have something in common with the last few players, she'd tried her luck with an ornate wooden lockbox- perhaps representing a prisoner- but no. For her second try, she'd gone for the ridiculously obvious, choosing a bejewelled golden crown; after all, the Scarecrow had been King of Oz when the Nomes had captured him. No luck there, either.

Two guesses down, one to go; one single solitary guess that would save her life and the lives of her friends- or doom them. And _so_ many objects to choose from and so many different patterns to choose from...

And it was then that, as her gaze swept across the vast ornament collection, a very stupid idea tumbled into her head: _don't choose at all. Don't try and overthink it: this is supposed to be a_ guessing_ game, isn't it?_

Very slowly, she closed her eyes; then, she began to spin around on the spot, arms outstretched in front of her. Silently, she began counting down to ten, all the while carrying on with her mad whirling dance; she knew that the Nome King was probably watching her at this very moment and probably thought she'd gone completely mad, but she was beyond caring. After all, back in Kansas, people had called her crazy for believing in Oz; she hadn't cared then, why should she care now? So, she carried on spinning until her count finally ran down to zero.

She stopped for a moment to recover her balance; then, eyes still held tightly shut and arms still outstretched in front of her, she began to march forward. She knew she wouldn't have to walk very far, though: the sheer number of ornaments here meant that she'd probably bump into one within the next twenty seconds.

_And that ornament will be the one I choose,_ she thought, smiling blindly.

Was it her imagination, or was she actually having fun?

* * *

"A game?" Mombi echoed. "For their energies? This doesn't make any sense: if you wanted them like this, then why not just transform them all into ornaments on the spot?"

"It's more fun this way," said the King.

_And I can clearly tell you're lying, you old bastard. You don't want me to get too close to your secrets; you haven't even told me why you want to become human in the first place- and you certainly didn't want to tell me about this quest for humanity when you first commissioned my services either. What are you up to?_

A more pertinent line of thought occurred to Mombi, and she voiced it almost without thinking: "But if she guesses right and finds out about Ozma-"

The King shot upright, face twisted into a snarl of rage. _**"OZMA?"**_ he boomed. **"YOU HAVEN'T LET **_**HER **_**ESCAPE AS WELL?"**

"No, no, no," Mombi simpered. "She's still sealed away, just like you wanted."

Very slowly, the King returned to his seat. "Then there's nothing to worry about," he said, voice calm and self-assured once again.

* * *

Several dozen steps away from her starting position, Dorothy's shoes impacted the wall; her hands trailed through empty air- she was standing in front of one of the shelves set into the wall.

Gingerly, she stretched out her arms a little further- and was immediately rewarded by the feeling of polished metal under her fingertips of her left hand; she reached out to grasp the ornament- accidentally knocking another over in the process.

For a moment, she held the ornament in her hands, feeling it's features without daring to open her eyes. Then, she risked a quick peek, hoping that looking wouldn't jinx her chances somehow. As it turned out, she was holding a small gold statuette in the shape of a robin sitting on a branch.

_Here goes nothing,_ she thought.

She took a deep breath...

* * *

"Ah, Ozma," the King mused aloud. "The last of a dynasty forgotten by Oz. Soon to be the last survivor of Oz, once I've taken care of Elphaba and Glinda."

Mombi licked her lips. "Can I be the one to kill them?" she asked. "I'm not demanding it or anything like that, but as far as boons go, it'd be more than enough compensation for my services..."

The King gave her a look that could have seared flesh from bone. "That won't be necessary. But rest assured," he added, his expression brightening, "Soon, there'll be no-one left who remembers Oz, and I will be completely human..."

* * *

At the last moment, Dorothy hesitated. Putting the bird statuette back where she'd found it, she looked back at the ornament that she'd accidentally knocked over:

It was an emerald the size of an apple; cut into a perfect diamond, it glittered beautifully where it lay on the shelf. Looking into its depths, Dorothy found herself thinking back to the emeralds that had once coated the walls of the Emerald City... and suddenly remembered:

"_... They're real, alright,"_ the Scarecrow had once told her. _"Practically a symbol of Oz itself; I've heard it's replaced the O-over-Z emblem in some parts of the country..."_

"_**ALL THOSE EMERALDS IN THE EMERALD CITY REALLY BELONGED TO ME,"**_the King had told her.

"_...knowing the King, he'll have picked something appropriate to each victim..."_ the Witch had told her.

"_**YOUR FRIEND IS THE THIEF!"**_

_A king transformed into the symbol of his kingdom, _Dorothy thought; _a thief punished by being transformed into what he'd stolen._ Suddenly, the jigsaw puzzle was piecing itself together; it made sense- perfect, perfect sense. After all, why else would the King tuck the emerald in a corner of a shelf so far away from the most eye-catching ornaments of the collection if not to hide it from the players?

_Of course, I _could_ be wrong,_ she thought. _This could be the guess that finally kills me. Maybe I should think this over a little, stall for time..._

But then she remembered something the Witch had told her: _"You've been very brave thus far- braver than I ever thought you could be; this will all be over soon, one way or the other, and all you need to do is be brave just a _little_ longer."_

She couldn't stall this any longer: she had the nearest thing she'd ever get to a correct answer, and now was the time to announce it.

Hesitantly, she grasped the emerald, closed her eyes, and took the deepest breath she'd ever taken in her entire life. Then, throwing every last shred of caution to the wind, she shouted the words, "OZ!"

And the world around her disappeared in a blinding flash of light.


	34. Checkmate

A/N: At long last, my latest chapter- all fifteen thousand frakking words of it. And I still had to chainsaw it to make sure the chapter didn't end up having too much in it (and quite frankly, it's a very eventful chapter already). I had a lot of fun writing this, and in any event, I hope you enjoy the latest and most explosive chapter.

Inbalwolf, I'm sorry for making you wait, and I'm afraid we'll have to delay my ascension to godhood; I wanted to have that reunion scene in this chapter, but given just how much anarchy and mayhem I compacted into it, it's going to wait until the next chapter or thereabouts.

Wile E Coyote: to answer your question, I can honestly say that even the King's not entirely sure what he's doing; with his brain being steadily unhinged by all the overpurified magic, chances are he only remembers wanting to make an example of the country.

And finally, to GoodWitchesOfOz, I think I've always been a sadist when it comes to cliffhangers; I'm glad you think a happy ending's uncertain- it means I'm doing something right in regards to suspense.

So, with the thank-yous out of the way, let's get down to the latest chapter; read, review and enjoy, ladies and gents!

Disclaimer: Oz/Wicked/Return To Oz are not mine. Trust me on this.

* * *

For one horrible moment, Dorothy thought that she'd guessed incorrectly, that this brilliant flash of light would be the last thing she'd see with human eyes. But then there was a loud clatter of ornaments hitting the ground, and when the light returned to normal and Dorothy could see again, there was a familiar figure sitting on the shelf.

"Dorothy?"

Heart leaping, Dorothy flung her arms around the Scarecrow, for once too overjoyed to even speak.

* * *

Far above the ornament collection, the Nome King's brow wrinkled in confusion. He'd heard the sound of Dorothy making her final guess and felt the rush of magical energies flowing in and out of the room, but instead of unlocking the last remaining aspects of the Ruby Slipper's power, the sacrifice had somehow lessened his control over it: the godlike power he'd been using scant minutes ago was _gone._ And true, he still had his own magic and all the power the Ruby Slippers had afforded him with the first two sacrifices, but this was no substitute for the puissance of a deity. How could this have happened?

And then he happened to glance down at his hand, and realized the truth: he hadn't become more human; he'd become _less _human. His flesh had reverted to the stone that had composed it during the previous stage of his transformation- meaning that the energies which had allowed the most recent one had been revoked... which could only mean that Dorothy Gale had managed to guess correctly.

"**Smudge and blazes..."** he said mildly.

* * *

"What happened to me?"

By now, the Scarecrow was back on his feet again, and though he seemed a bit shakier than before, there didn't seem to be any lingering effects from his transformation. "Seriously, what happened?" he asked. "The last thing I remember was bumping into you, then darkness."

"You were an ornament."

"I'm sorry?"

Dorothy explained herself as quickly as she could: she told him about the transformation, about the Nome King's game, how he'd cheated and how the others had been slowly transformed into ornaments themselves. In fact, the only thing she didn't mention was her encounter with the Witch; that could wait until later, when they were safe. Finally, she concluded the story with how she'd discovered the emerald that the Scarecrow had been transformed into... and then an idea struck her.

"Green," she said quietly.

"Hmm?"

"You were a green ornament," she said slowly. She looked around the room, eyes frantically scanning the shelves of the ornament collection: there were thousands of objects here, made of practically every precious material imaginable and coloured almost every hue of the rainbow. However, for all the tones of gold, silver, red, blue, black and white, green seemed curiously rare.

"Maybe that's the pattern!" she hissed. "Maybe the green ornaments are the other players."

* * *

The Nome King's eyes widened in disbelief: she'd discovered the key to the puzzle. Against all expectations, Dorothy Gale had found the key to defeating the game; from here on, the ritual was officially worthless... and all because Elphaba had managed to give her a clue before he'd been able to petrify her!

"**Fumes... and **_**FURNACES**_**..."** he snarled furiously, his fists clenching and unclenching of their own accord. Rage bubbled and churned beneath his rocky half-human epidermis; the old anger was making itself felt again, the familiar mixture of frustration and shock bubbling towards an explosion. In that moment, he wanted to let it all out, to let everything within reach evaporate in some cataclysmic maelstrom of fire. But he had to keep his head; he had to calm down if he was to enact the contingencies... but he needed to take his frustrations out on _something._

He briefly considered Mombi, who was still kneeling before him, nervousness radiating from every pore; for a while, he toyed with the idea of tearing her skin off, animating the flayed hide and making it throttle her to death. Eventually, though, he decided against it: murder didn't help these angry fits at all. So, his frustration briefly cresting, he tore the pipe from his mouth and threw it across the room with enough thaumaturgical strength to detonate the thing as soon as it hit the ground.

Then, his gaze flickered back towards Mombi (who'd ducked to avoid the hail of shrapnel), and another train of thought suddenly began to pick up speed inside his head:

"_**You let her escape..."**_ he said slowly.

* * *

"Found one!"

After a few seconds of hunting through the collection, the Scarecrow was holding a small jade paperweight in his hands; peering closely at its surface, Dorothy noticed a vague antler-like pattern encircling its rim. _Probably the Gump,_ she thought absently.

Taking the paperweight from the Scarecrow's outstretched hands, Dorothy exclaimed "Oz!" and was rewarded with another vivid flash of light; when it faded, the Gump was standing before her, looking understandably bewildered.

* * *

"**PETRIFIED... POLYMORPHS..."** the King thundered.

He didn't need to feel the sensation of rock flooding back into his body to realise that he was almost completely Nome again- barring his two human eyeballs and a few other organic components. More to the point, he was running out of ways to keep his temper under control: Dorothy Gale was running rampant downstairs, swiftly turning the ritual against him; and no matter how many times he told himself that the contingency plans were still in place and that he could still attain humanity through Elphaba or Glinda, he simply wasn't in the mood to listen to that infuriating little voice of reason. His attention was almost entirely focussed on the figure cowering before him; the train of thought loose in his skull couldn't be stopped now, and the idea of Mombi being the saboteur behind everything was too logical to ignore.

"**YOU HAD HER,"** he roared, **"**_**AND YOU LET HER ESCAPE!**_** YOU WANTED THIS ALL ALONG, DIDN'T YOU? **_**DIDN'T YOU?!**_** HOW MUCH HELP DID YOU GIVE HER, YOU TREACHEROUS LITTLE BITCH? DID YOU GIVE HER DIRECTIONS TO THIS PALACE? DID YOU MAKE THAT FLYING CREATURE JUST TO CARRY HER HERE? DID YOU ARM HER AS AN ASSASSIN? IS SHE CARRYING ANYTHING THAT COULD KILL A NOME? **_**ANSWER ME!"**_

"I didn't give her anything! She just broke out!"

"**OH REALLY? AM I TO BELIEVE YOU'RE HONESTLY THAT STUPID? AM I TO BELIEVE THAT A GIRL LESS THAN HALF YOUR AGE WITH NO MAGICAL POWER JUST **_**HAPPENED**_** TO GET HER HANDS ON EVERYTHING SHE NEEDED TO ESCAPE YOU AND YOUR SECURITY MEASURES?"**

"It wasn't my fault!" Mombi shrilled, a note of defiance trickling into her voice. "If you'd given me a _real_ army-"

But the King had finally heard enough. **"I'LL DEAL WITH **_**YOU**_** LATER," **he roared, and waved a hand. Mombi had just enough time to beat a hasty retreat towards the exit- before the iron walls of the cage materialized around her. Trapped, she clawed wildly at the bars, trying to magically slice her way out, to no avail; as angry as he was, the King could still repress the witch's powers- at least until the time came to disembowel her with her own ribs.

For the moment, though, he had contingency plans to attend to, and he couldn't afford to drift any further away from humanity. Pausing only to shroud the ornament collection in the strongest temporal spell he could muster- strong enough to keep Dorothy and the others subdued until this debacle was resolved- he turned and fled back through the earth towards the corridor where he'd left Elphaba.

* * *

In all but a few mercifully rare cases, petrifaction meant instant unconsciousness for anyone afflicted with it; once the curse had run its course and you were well and truly a statue, you were effectively comatose- no awareness, no thoughts, no dreams, not even the vague flickerings of consciousness that preceded a return to the waking world. All mental functions, from personality to memories, were suspended until the spell was undone.

As such, the first thing Elphaba knew of the curse finally being lifted was a sudden weakness at the knees, as though she'd been standing up for too long; toppling backwards, she felt something soft break her fall. Then, then her eyes flickered open, and- once she'd adjusted to the bright light- she found herself back in her cell, sitting on the bed. For a moment, she wondered if she'd ever left, if her conversation with Dorothy had been just some over-optimistic dream. Then, she saw the Nome King protruding from the wall in front her: the good-humoured expression had vanished from his face, along with most of the humanity; in fact, all that remained of his ongoing transformation were his eyes- which were now looking decidedly bloodshot.

In spite of herself, Elphaba grinned. "I take it that things didn't go as planned?" she asked.

The King's face- already dour and unsmiling- suddenly _twitched_ with the effort of suppressing a violent outburst. **"It doesn't matter,"** he said firmly. **"Suffice to say that Dorothy Gale is no longer a viable option, thanks in no small part due to your efforts." **He took a very deep breath that he probably no longer needed, before continuing: **"As... frustrating as your interference was, I'm not here to punish you; quite frankly, I'm not in the mood for that sort of thing. I'm here to extend another offer of-"**

"Allow me to save you a lot of time and frustration: the answer is still no."

"**You haven't even heard what I have to say!"**

"You made your offer blatant enough last time, remember? Or did you lose track of that memory between the last three or four magical surges?"

"**I'M NOT..."** The King stopped, and took another deep breath; as he did so, Elphaba felt the shackles around her magical powers loosen _ever_ so slightly. **"I'm not losing my memory,"** the King continued, his voice now suffused with an air of exaggerated calm. **"I simply wanted to elaborate on how I can reward you: I mean, I've already made it perfectly clear that I can give you literally anything once the power of the Ruby Slippers is unlocked-"**

"And you've made it perfectly clear that you can't handle the effects of their power as a human being; to be brutally honest, your highness, I think you're better off without them."

"**This nonsense **_**again!**_** How many times do I have to tell you- I am not suffering from any of the side-effects you mentioned, and there is nothing wrong with my memory. Now, would you please try and take this offer seriously?"**

"I am taking it seriously: I just don't think you have anything concrete to offer me; everything you've suggested depends on you being able to keep the side-effects of purified magical current under control, and so far, you haven't convinced me that you're up to it."

Once again, the King's face briefly contorted in rage. **"Fine,"** he said wearily, teeth gritted. **"I won't even bother to mention how ridiculous this talk of side-effects is... just tell me what you want. I'm not offering anymore fantasies at this stage, I'm offering concrete rewards: what do you want?"**

"Why, have you forgotten why I came here in the first place?"

"_**Just tell me, damn you!"**_ the King shouted, and Elphaba only just managed to stop herself from smirking as she felt the nullification collapse a little further. _It's working,_ she thought;_ I just have to keep aggravating him, keep him too angry to think rationally- and hope that I can keep him that way until Diggs and the War Engine get here._

"Fiyero and Glinda," she answered aloud. "I want them released them from captivity. I also want the Flying Monkeys restored to life, and I want a place where we can live- preferably somewhere that you _don't_ have a grudge against." And for the second time in as many minutes, Elphaba had to stop herself from smiling; the look of sheer relief on the Nome King's face was nothing short of hilarious.

"**That sounds perfectly equitable to me." **He concentrated for a moment, and then the Grimmerie appeared on the bed next to Elphaba.** "Once you've cast the spell and the eff- Oh what is it **_**now?"**_

A Nome messenger had appeared in the wall to the left of the King, and was currently finishing a series of increasingly deferential bows. "Many apologies for disturbing you, Your Majesty," it droned, "but our forces stationed on the Plateau are reporting freak thaumaturgical activity. They say that the terrain is-"

"**Reshaping itself,"** the King finished through gritted teeth- unwittingly taking further pressure off Elphaba's magic in the process. **"I'm well aware of what's happening out there, thank you very much."**

"The observers are reporting similar activity in Oz-"

"**I **_**know!**_** Just tell the commanders to stay put until the anomalies subside. So long as the troops don't try to interfere- or venture into Munchkinland- they won't be harmed. Now be off with you; I don't want any further disturbances."**

"But the commanders will need to be informed of what to do if the phenomena in Oz-"

"_**No. Further. Disturbances.**_** And make sure the palace staff are made aware of my orders, so I don't have to spend the next hour deflecting more idiot couriers. Do I make myself clear?"**

The messenger hesitated; it might have been Elphaba's imagination, but she thought she saw a confused expression (and just a hint of mistrust) drifting across the otherwise blank face. Then, without another word, it nodded and exited.

"**So,"** the King grumbled, **"We were getting around to you casting the spell, I believe..."**

Elphaba briefly considered her options: for a time, she thought that she might have a chance of catching the Nome King by surprise if she pretended to accept the deal and used the Grimmerie against him the moment her powers were unshackled and the book was open in her lap. After all, he couldn't translate the incantations by himself, let alone recognize what they could do by sound alone. But then, with the failure of his first plan, it was likely that the King would be alert for any sign of betrayal. No, it was obvious that she was going to have to annoy her way out. The question was, how should she begin? What could she say or do to annoy the King beyond all reason?

_Quite a lot at this point, _she thought. Out loud, she said, "I'm pretty sure there should have been a "please" somewhere in that sentence."Over the gentle thud of the King's jaws very slowly dropping open, Elphaba continued: "Don't ask me how, Your Royal Highness, but I've got the distinct impression that becoming a human being and harnessing the power of the Ruby Slippers means virtually everything to you. And, I could be wrong, but with Dorothy Gale and the ritual out of the picture, I might just be the quickest and safest path you have to achieving humanity. Call me old fashioned, but I think that might warrant just a _hint_ of politesse."

The King's expression shifted rapidly between anger and disbelief. **"You... you're seriously asking for formality **_**now**_** of all times?"**

"I'm just saying it's easier to catch flies with honey, if you know what I mean. And _smile,"_ she added. "You're achieving a dream, in case you hadn't noticed; it wouldn't hurt you to look slightly pleased with yourself."

Visibly suppressing another explosion, the King took the deepest breath he'd taken thus far, and forced his face into an agonized rictus that- if you were to look closely- might accidentally resemble an amused smile. **"Very well then,"** he said, barely moving his lips. **"Elphaba, would you **_**please**_** transform me into a human?"**

"Another please, if you don't mind. You sounded too disgruntled on the last one."

"**... please."**

"Pretty please."

"**Wha... di... did you just regress into a six-year-old?! This is **_**asinine!**_**"**

At last, Elphaba let the smirk creep across her face. In all her life, she'd never have thought that she'd find herself teasing her way to victory- certainly not in her time as the Wicked Witch of the West. Oh, she'd read about this kind of approach in the pulp novels that Boq had left scattered across Shiz like literary dandruff, and she'd rolled her eyes at every snide, wisecracking hero in their pages- up until she'd met Fiyero, of course. But, after so much time taking her rebellion against the Wizard so direly seriously, she'd never imagined she'd actually be in a position to play at being this kind of hero... and against all expectations, she was really enjoying herself now- if only because of the way that the Nome King's smiling exterior was splitting down the middle.

"Do you want to be transformed or not?" she demanded. "Now, say the words "pretty please," or the deal is officially off. And with a bit of enthusiasm, if you don't mind."

"**... pretty please."**

"With a cherry on top."

"**... with... a... cherry... on... top..."** The King fumed.

"Well done," said Elphaba flatly. She considered ending the stream of irritations right there, to just tell the King that she wasn't interested in honouring the deal. But then a new idea occurred to her, and in her excitement, she couldn't resist voicing it: "Now start grovelling."

There was a deathly pause, as the King's jaw dropped open for the second time in as many minutes; this time, though, Elphaba felt his grip on her powers falter and almost fail. After a couple of attempts to speak that produced only vowelless snarls and expectorations, he finally managed to choke out the words, **"You want me to do **_**what?**_**"**

"It's very simple, Your Highness: I want you to get down on your knees and grovel; a few genuflects, a flowery honorific or two, perhaps bang your head on the floor once or twice... I'm not saying you'll have to kiss my feet or anything like that, but that's always an option that I'd like to keep open-"

And that was when the King hit her.

As she soared across the bed, Elphaba was vaguely aware that being backhanded in the face by a solid stone fist would probably have killed her instantly had the King not had the presence of mind to magically cushion his knuckles at the very last minute. _So I obviously haven't gotten him angry enough,_ she thought. _Where's Diggs, though? He should be here by now._

Thankfully, instead of hitting the wall, she ended up bouncing off the pillow-laden headboard and landing in a heap on the bed. Vision blurring, she sat up and immediately tasted blood; the punch had split her lower lip open. "Wow," she laughed blearily. "I think that was the first time you've actually used your fists in the time we've known each other. I haven't made you angry, have I?"

"**ENOUGH!" **the King roared.

Lunging forward, he grabbed her by the shoulders and slammed her against the wall- hard enough to make sparks flash before her eyes as the back of her head made bone-jarring contact with the solid rock. Then, once he'd recovered enough of his temper to speak clearly, the King snarled, **"You are going to cast the spell I want, or I am going to start punishing Glinda; an inch of skin for every refusal- and that'll be just the beginning. After that, Fiyero will be next; you might **_**think**_** you made him incapable of pain, but there are things left in the bowels of this palace that can make someone as desensitized as your dearly beloved scream in agony."**

"You're getting desperate, Your Highness."

"**Oh really? You feel like taking risks with the lives of your friends?"**

"I'm not taking risks; I'm explaining facts. For a start, if you hurt Glinda- or gods forbid, kill her- and you're actually stupid enough to put the Grimmerie in my hands after that, the first thing I'm going to do is burn it. Then myself. And then you'll have nothing; you'll be just a tired old man who came within a gnat's wing of being a legend and lost it all because he couldn't restrain himself at the last minute. But then, you already know all about that, don't you?"

For perhaps a second or two, the King's face was frozen in an expression of utter disbelief, as if what he'd just been told was beyond credibility. Then, the anger reappeared on his face, worse than ever before. **"You self-righteous little ingrate,"** he hissed. **"I offered you everything you ever wanted and you repay my generosity with this... **_**farcical act**_**..."**

"Actually, if memory serves, I turned down your offer politely enough the first time. It was only after I found out you wanted to kill Fiyero that I got angry... unless you remember that differently-"

"**Oh damn it, would you kindly give up on subterfuge? I'm not interested in hearing it!"**

"For the last time, it's not subterfuge: it's the truth! You're channelling so much power from the Ruby Slippers that quantities of it are flowing out of your grip and into your brain, and for every second you stay connected to that stream of power, your mind is going to suffer for it. I mean, just look at the Slippers, and you'll see for yourself. Better still, ask yourself- do you even remember why you wanted this power in the first place?"

"**I already told you- I'M NOT INTERESTED IN HEARING IT!"**

The King's already-vice-like grip on her shoulders tightened, and Elphaba swore she could hear her bones cracking under the pressure; on the upside, the smarting lump on the back of her head was no longer nearly as much concern as it had been.

"**If you listen to a word I have to say to you, Elphaba, listen to this,"** the King snarled menacingly. **"You are going to cast that spell, or I am going to leave you in this room for the rest of eternity: the bathroom will be sealed, your meals will be cancelled, the ventilation will be cut off, and the lights will be permanently extinguished. You'll die alone and in darkness, taunted by the knowledge that you came within **_**inches**_** of seeing Glinda and Fiyero again and threw it all away for-"**

Elphaba burst out laughing. She couldn't help it: against all expectations, one of her plans had actually worked for a change, she'd ended up bluffing her way through the last few minutes of conversation, and now the King was trying to threaten her with a permanent stay in an oubliette... when one of his own servants was ready to help her escape. True, the King didn't know about Basalt or the War Engine being constructed just a few feet below them, but that only made things seem all the more hilarious.

Needless to say, laughing in the already-enraged Nome's face didn't work wonders for his temper. Bellowing in rage, he flung her across the room, stopping _just_ short of actually throwing her at the wall. **"FINE!" **he shouted, as Elphaba rolled to a halt on the opposite side of the cell. **"STAY HERE AND ROT!"**

Then, without another word, he disappeared into the floor, taking the Grimmerie with him.

For about fifteen seconds, Elphaba lay there, giggling to herself in spite of her bruises. She'd done it; the nullification had finally collapsed, and her powers were free again. In sheer ecstasy, she allowed the familiar magic energies to swirl across her fingers and cast their emerald glow on the walls, and for the first time since she'd been imprisoned in this gilded cage beneath the earth, she stretched her thaumaturgical muscles once again. She'd compared the nullification spell to shackles, and indeed, it felt as though she'd been weighed down chains and manacles for most of her time in the palace, and now that she was free-

She sat up, banishing the illumination from her hands. "Basalt!" she hissed. "Are you there?"

There was an answering rumble from the nearby wall. "Apologies for not interfering, Miss Elphaba."

"It's okay," Elphaba muttered, absent-mindedly feeling her jaw for loosened teeth. "I heard what you said about not being able to disobey the King. But where's Diggs and the War Engine?"

"They are still downstairs, awaiting a target they can attack; at present, the Nome King's location is still unknown. Nonetheless, Mr Diggs is ready to start the machine on your command."

"Nevermind that for the moment: now that he's lost patience with Dorothy and me, the King's almost certainly going to try Glinda next. He's either going to sit back and wait for the translation to finish, or he's going to force her to pick up the pace." She took a deep breath; this wasn't a command she'd ever wanted to give, but at this point, they were out of options. "Either way, we need to get to her cell as quickly as possible; it's time Glinda learned the truth."

* * *

Thirty seconds later, the two of them emerged from the walls and into the plush interior of Glinda's cell. Immediately, Elphaba noticed the same oppressive near-silence that had surrounded the room on her last visit; there no gasps of shock, no disbelieving screams of "Elphie!" or even the sound of pen against paper. The only thing they could hear at that moment was their footsteps, and the mumbling of the room's occupant, who was fast asleep on the bed.

Much like the last time, all attempts to wake Glinda were met with failure; the Nome King might have lost his grip on the anti-magic spell, but he was still able to induce sleep without fail. Even attempts to rouse her with magic didn't work.

"I don't understand," said Elphaba. "Why would the King put her back to sleep when he'd need her for the translation? Have we arrived ahead of him or something?"

Basalt surreptitiously ducked in and out of the nearby wall, and then answered, "It would appear not, Miss Elphaba: the King is actually in the ceiling directly above us."

"Then why hasn't he killed us both? He should have noticed us by now."

"I..." Basalt hesitated, and his blank face once more somehow took on a semblance of human emotion- this time of deep-seated concern. "It is possible that he has another way of getting the information he needs; before the ritual began, Miss Glinda told me that, since arriving in the palace, she'd had several lucid dreams of you helping her with the translation. She also mentioned that these dreams helped her ignore any nervousness about working for the King-"

Elphaba barely heard the rest of Basalt's explanation; she was already checking Glinda for any other active spells. "She's definitely dreaming," she muttered. "And whatever's happening in that dream, there's almost certainly a lot of magic involved... I suppose it makes sense: the King _would_ want a way to convince Glinda to stay loyal to him, and from what little I've read about Dream Magic the caster has to be asleep or in a meditative trance for the spells to work- probably why the King hasn't noticed us. Trouble is, we can't wake Glinda up even with my magic until we've broken his hold on her. And we can't just wait for her to wake up, either: the King's guaranteed to come out of his trance ahead of her and..."

There was a thoughtful pause.

"Would it be possible for _you_ to use Dream Magic, Miss Elphaba?" Basalt asked hesitantly.

She shook her head. "I've studied it, but I've honestly never practiced it more than once or twice, and breaking another magician's hold on a dreamer would take a lot of skill and experience that I don't honestly have with this branch of magic. In fact, I only know one dream spell, and I only learned it to spice up Saturday nights -" Her eyes lit up. "_Oh."_

Before Basalt could ask any more questions, Elphaba hurriedly slipped her bag off her shoulder and begun rummaging through it. _Please let there be enough for this, _she thought desperately, _please let me have be just enough for a sleeping dose._ Out loud, she explained, "The one technique I learned was of how to share dreams. The trouble is, I never learned how to properly meditate my way into dreams, so I'm going to have to sedate myself... I think I ended up taking some- _here_ we are!"

She held up a small vial of clear fluid. "I pocketed this from Rasp's operation earlier," she explained hastily. "Thought it might be useful if we ever needed some painkiller in a hurry, but I suppose it'll be good enough to put me to sleep- thank Oz it doesn't have to be taken intravenously, I don't have any syringes. Now, I might not be able to break Glinda out of this dream, but there's a chance I might be able to _talk_ her out it. While I'm in there, you'll have to contact Diggs and get him moving in this direction; as long as the dream's intact, the King is going to be the best stationary target that War Engine will ever have."

"As you wish, Miss Elphaba. Good luck."

"I'm going to need it," she muttered, as Basalt vanished into the wall.

She took a deep breath. For five long seconds she regarded the vial of sedative in her hands, wondering if it was safe to use: this had actually been one of the things they _hadn't_ used during the operation, even when Woolwax needed to be calmed down. Quite simply, it was too strong to be used for anything other than as a sleeping aid, and according to the label, it was only meant to be drunk when diluted with hot water; there was no telling what would happen if Elphaba were to try drinking even a few drops straight. And even if it worked, even if she did manage to enter Glinda's dream, there was no guaranteeing that she'd be able to convince her of anything when the Nome King had a duplicate of her at work there- one that Glinda would probably be more inclined to believe than her.

But then again, if the sedative poisoned her, if the King killed her before she could get through to Glinda or before the War Engine arrived... well, she'd known the risks from the moment she'd ventured back into Oz. Hadn't she faced worse dangers in the last few days?

Elphaba bit her lip; she couldn't get bogged down in self-doubt now. She _had_ to try- even if she could only manage to keep the Nome King busy until the War Engine got here.

So, without another moment of hesitation, she unstoppered the vial and tentatively swallowed five- or possibly eight- droplets of sedative. Immediately, she shuddered at the bitter aftertaste, and quietly chided herself for thinking that it would have been anything other than foul; after all, this stuff was heavy-duty tranquilizer, and it was only meant to be taken mixed with a glass of water.

And then she felt the first of the potion's effects: the ground beneath her feet seemed to rock and sway, as if she was standing on the deck of a ship in a storm; her legs were going numb, and her sense of balance was fading too. Then, a moment later, Elphaba's knees gave way. Cursing herself for not sitting down before she'd taken the dose, she grabbed the nearest bedpost and hauled herself awkwardly onto the bed, until she was lying right next to Glinda. _Two minutes,_ she thought blearily. _It's supposed to take two minutes to induce unconsciousness. How long has it been? Thirty seconds? A minute?_

Her eyelids fluttered wildly. It was becoming difficult to think clearly; the urge to close her eyes and let sleep claim her was overpowering anything else in her mind. It was as if the combined exhaustion of five whole days of work without rest had been magically forced on her, worse than any other kind of sleep deprivation she'd undergone in her life; not even the longs nights she'd spent on the run from the Wizard's guards couldn't compare.

In the last few seconds before darkness finally enveloped her, she was vaguely aware that Glinda had reached out and unknowingly grabbed Elphaba's right hand. And in spite of herself, Elphaba could only smile as she drifted into unconsciousness: even if the sedative _did_ kill her, at least she wouldn't die alone...

* * *

"_**What?"**_ a voice snarled. **"How did you follow me here? How did you escape?!"**

It was once again that fateful night at Kiamo Ko, and the hall had been set for their final meeting the drapes were open and through the great mural window, the distant lights of the Emerald City glittered on the horizon like the gemstone it had been named for. Once again, the moon cast a haunting, unearthly glow on the landscape below, perfectly underscoring what had been one of the most sorrowful moments of Elphaba's life. True, the sounds of the approaching witch-hunters was entirely absent, and the flying monkeys were nowhere to be found, but as far as she could see, this dream was otherwise identical to the events of that terrible evening; nothing had changed.

But the atmosphere was different; along with the weird, unreal feeling that Elphaba had come to associate with the rare times when she _knew_ she was dreaming, there was an ominously forbidding air to the place. She was reminded of a time in her childhood when she'd dared to creep into Frexspar's study to borrow a book: every minute she'd spent in that room, she'd been terrified that a servant- or worse yet, her "father"- might happen to enter and find her. But this was almost imperceptibly different: back when she'd been eight years old, the only thing urging her out of the room was her own fear; right now, something in the air was literally ordering her to leave.

_That's probably the King's influence over this dream, _she thought. _Question is, why doesn't he just force me out of the dream altogether?_ She considered the question for a moment- before realization hit: _Maybe he can't: maybe I've gotten him too angry to concentrate on that._

And then Elphaba saw the figures gathering by the window: the first was instantly recognizable as Glinda, for she was dressed exactly as she had been on the night the two of them had said their final goodbyes; but the other figure was a replica of Elphaba- undoubtedly the Nome King in disguise. At the moment, the two of them were engaged in a very heated conversation, and though most of it was inaudible to her, the King appeared to be warning her of something.

_Probably me,_ she thought.

Sure enough, as she drew closer, she heard the King whisper, "-invading your mind. Don't ask me what it is; all I know is that it looks like one of the Hungers you saw down in the caverns, and it's getting closer and closer."

"But how could it have gotten inside my head? Never mind that, how could it have gotten close enough to me to even do that? What's happened to Basalt?"

"I don't _know!_ For all I know, the entire palace is in ruins, Basalt and the rest of the Nomes are all dead, and your room is crawling with Hungers- I don't know. The point is, there's something inside your head, trying to-"

It was at that point, as Elphaba crept closer to the arguing pair, that Glinda happened to glance in her direction. There was immediate silence as her eyes focussed on the new arrival, then abruptly turned back towards the disguised King, who was now wearing an expression of not-so-disguised rage.

"Who the hell are _you?"_ Glinda asked.

Elphaba blinked rapidly. Out of all the things she'd expected to hear upon seeing her old friend again, "who the hell are you" was the last entry on a very long list. It would have been funny had the situation not been so dire: clearly, Glinda couldn't tell the difference between her and the Nome King, and quite frankly, Elphaba couldn't blame her- there _was_ no difference as far as surface appearances went. And besides, she'd spent the better part of the last few days with this all-too-convincing duplicate- more time than Elphaba had spent with Glinda in the last _year; _it was no wonder she didn't trust her.

She swallowed hard; there was a lump at the back of her throat. "Glinda, it's me," she said, trying not to let her voice waver as she spoke. "I'm not part of the dream- I'm the real Elphaba."

"Don't listen to it!" the King hissed. "That's a Stygian Hunger- it's just taken my form as camouflage!"

"_Your_ form? Glinda, that's the Nome King- he's taken _my_ form to get you to trust him!" She thought for a moment, and added, "While we're on the subject, what the hell _is_ a Stygian Hunger?"

Glinda looked blankly from one version of Elphaba to the next, clearly looking for differences. "What do you mean "you're the real Elphaba" exactly?" she demanded.

"It means that she's an imposter with a very poorly thought-out alibi."

"Oh _shut it!"_ Elphaba burst out. "She wasn't asking you!" She took a deep breath; this was going to be the hardest confession of her entire life- she couldn't afford to lose momentum now. She continued, voice infuriatingly weak: "When I said that I was the real Elphaba, I meant just that: I'm not an imposter; I'm not a ghost, or a dream or anything like that; I'm the Elphaba you've known since we first met at Shiz..."

She saw the expression of distrust on Glinda's face deepen, and she trailed off, her throat tightened with emotion- allowing the Nome King to take the advantage: "Come on Glinda," he scoffed witheringly. "It's obvious that the damn thing's lying through its teeth; it's another Hunger- it's just that this one's after your mind, not your flesh."

"For the second time, _I am not a fucking Hunger-"_

"SHUT UP BOTH OF YOU!" Glinda yelled. Once the bickering had finally subsided, she took a deep breath and asked, "How can you be the real Elphaba? I mean, how can you be alive when I saw you melt back in Kiamo Ko? _In this room!_"she added, gesturing furiously at the chamber around her.

And here it was: the moment she'd been dreading. She wanted to keep her cool now, more than ever; she wanted to explain things as calmly and rationally as she could; most of all, she wanted to be able to meet Glinda's eyes. But she couldn't: voice choked and gaze fixed in the general direction of the floor, she could only mumble, "Because I faked it."

"_What?"_

"I faked my death, Glinda. I've never been allergic to water in my life; the whole thing was just a rumour until I decided to use it to escape Oz. The moment I was hit with the bucket of water, I lowered myself into a trapdoor and left my cloak and hat behind to make it look as though I'd melted; I waited until you'd left along with Chistery and the other monkeys. And then... and then I left Oz; for the last year, I've been living out past the Deadly Desert. But when I heard what had happened to Oz, I had to come back- I had to help you, I..."

Almost incapable of speech, she trailed off again. She looked up, prepared for the worst: if Glinda's expression had looked distrusting before, now it looked outright disbelieving. Her mouth was clenched in an expression of hatred so unlike her familiar bubbly good-humouredness that Elphaba almost took a step back at the sight of it, and she now held her wand as if she really was intending to kill with it.

"You see?" the King sneered, his tone made all the harsher when rendered in Elphaba's voice. "You think that could ever really have happened? Do you think _I'd _have ever done that to you- my best friend, my _only_ friend? This isn't the real Elphaba; it's just one of the cleverer breeds of Stygian Hunger, and it's cobbled together a disguise that can't hold up to inspection."

"It's not a disguise." She could barely speak now; she was so close to tears.

"Then explain," Glinda demanded, voice deathly silent. "Give me some proof of all this. I mean, if you are the real Elphaba, why would you have left me?"

"Because it's making things up," the King sneered. "Because it's lying through its teeth-"

"_Because I had to!"_ Elphaba screamed.

There was a pause, as the echoes slowly died away; even the Nome King looked a bit startled by the outburst. Eventually, Elphaba continued; she was well aware that she was crying, but at this point she no longer cared. She needed to explain why she'd done this, to confess everything at long last. "I told you that night that you could do everything I couldn't do, _and I meant it,"_ she said, vainly trying to blink away tears. "You were trusted by the people, you understood the way Oz really worked, you had everything the government could possibly give you... you even had integrity when push came to shove: _you_ didn't break your best friend's heart, or neglect your family when they needed you the most. And I knew that if you tried to keep me hidden from the Wizard, you'd be in danger; people were already beginning to wonder about the stories of you meeting me back at Shiz: if they were to find out you were sheltering me, they'd turn on you, and none of your political connections would be able to save you. They'd have killed you, and it would've have been my fault from beginning to end, _just like it was with Nessa!_ So yes, I faked my death and abandoned you because it was the only way we could have both escaped alive, because it was the only way you could have ever been safe... _because I love you."_

A deathly silence followed, as Glinda once again looked from Elphaba to the perfectly-disguised Nome King, checking for differences. Beforehand, she'd looked certain that she was on the right side; now she looked completely lost.

"Come on, Glinda," Elphaba pleaded. "You know the King wouldn't have just trusted you to get the job done without betraying him; this dream you've been having- it's his way of keeping you under control."

The seconds dragged by and the silence grew even more desperate. Elphaba wondered, rather absentmindedly, why the King hadn't simply decided to attack her yet; after all, he was clearly enraged, but not enough to lose complete control of his powers. _Perhaps he's just trying to stay in character; he's impersonating a figment of Glinda's imagination, so I suppose it makes sense that he doesn't want to look too powerful for-_

"What did you keep under your pillow when we were at Shiz?" Glinda asked.

In perfect unison, both Elphaba and the Nome King asked "What?"

Glinda sighed furiously; it could have been her imagination, but she looked almost as close to tears as Elphaba had been a moment ago. "You want me to trust you?" she asked. "_Either _of you? Then answer my questions, and prove that you're the real Elphaba. Now, tell me: what did you keep under your pillow when we were at Shiz?"

Yet again, Elphaba and the King responded at the same time: "My little green bottle."

"And where did you get it?"

"It belonged to my mother," the two of them replied automatically.

"What happened to her?"

"She died giving birth to Nessa."

"What was the name of our history professor at Shiz?"

"Doctor Dillamond."

"And what happened to him?"

"Oh for Oz's sake, Glinda, this is _pointless!_" the King erupted. "It already knows everything about you; it's been in here long enough to access your memories- it'll know the answer to every question you ask!"

"So will he!" Elphaba retorted. "He's been spying on you, me and the rest of Oz for almost twenty years; he's seen every single conversation we had, every class we attended, every disaster we endured- and he's still spying on you even _now!_ This whole dream was set up just so he could keep tabs on your subconscious!"

"You haven't answered my question."

"... He was arrested-"

"- and brainwashed," finished the King.

"What was your mother's name?"

"Melena."

"How many pairs of shoes did I have at Shiz?"

"Twenty."

"And what was my nickname at the Across-Oz Summit last month?"

"Whisky breath," said the King automatically. His eyes very briefly widened as he realized his mistake. "Oh _shi_-"

Elphaba didn't even see the wand move: one second it was held lightly at Glinda's side; the next, it was pointed directly at the Nome King, it's point ablaze with blinding light and magic a thousand times more powerful than any of the few petty spells that Glinda had cast a year ago. And when the light faded, the King stood deathly still, a look of utter astonishment frozen on his face. He was still disguised; outwardly, he still looked almost exactly like Elphaba- with only one notable exception: the right side of his head had been blasted away, leaving a crumbling mess of rock where blood and tissue should have been.

"**...damn it,"** he muttered testily, and collapsed to the floor, his dream-form evaporating into nothingness as it went.

Silence reigned in the dreamworld for almost a minute and a half, as the Elphaba and Glinda regarded each other with blank expressions; neither of them seemed to have any idea what to do now that they were face to face.

And then, without warning, the entire castle flipped upside down as something rudely dragged Elphaba back into the waking world.

* * *

If the King had looked furious before, now he looked about two or three steps removed from an old-fashioned berserk rampage: his body- which had been kept in the dimensions of a human being for almost two days now- was beginning to warp out of shape, its limbs and torso stretching and thickening as more rock from the surrounding area was absorbed into it; great clouds of superheated steam jetted from his mouth whenever he opened his increasingly oversized jaws; rampant magical energies crackled and sparked around the tines of his crown, giving off a fierce smell of ozone as his self-control waned further still.

Worst of all were his eyes; after being forced to keep up with the permutations of his body and the flow of magic through him, his human eyeballs were so bloodshot they looked almost entirely red; his pupils were dilated now, to the point that they'd grown to cover his metallic-grey irises- leaving the King to look out at the world through red and black-toned eyes.

_And they probably hurt quite a bit as well,_ Elphaba thought absently, as the King loomed ever-so-slightly closer. He was actually holding her six feet off the ground, she realized, as her awareness of the world around her trickled back into place.

"**I've just about had enough of you!"** he thundered, upon seeing she was awake. **"I just went to the trouble of cleansing the tranquilisers from your system, and in hindsight, I'm wondering if shouldn't have let you die of an overdose. I mean, why couldn't you have stayed where I left you? Why couldn't you be satisfied with what you were offered? Why did you interfere when I would have given you everything?"**

"Isn't it obvious?" Elphaba laughed. "It's because you're a joke, Your Highness: the trouble is, you're not a very funny joke, so I'm trying to hurry you towards a punchline."

The King's stony lips curled upwards, baring his chisel-like teeth in a crude mimicry of a smile. **"You want a punchline? I'll give you one quite happily." **He was beginning to tighten his grip; perhaps he intended to crush her to death with his bare hands.** "It's no problem to me,"** he chortled. **"I think letting you into the palace was the second-worst mistake I've ever made..."**

"Letting me keep my wand was the worst," said Glinda quietly.

A beam of magic split both the air and the King's arms in two; as they crashed noisily to the ground, Glinda leapt out of bed, wand in hand and flinging bolts of rock-shattering energy at the wounded Nome. Hauling herself out from under the broken limbs, Elphaba joined her, bombarding the King with her own destructive spells, taking great chunks out of his torso and shoulders- and neatly clipping off his half-regenerated arms.

But the King wasn't so easily deterred:lightning _oozed_ from the stumps of his arms and cracked across the place where Glinda had been standing a moment ago, setting the bed on fire for good measure; magic spangled wildly about the room as the King's rage manifested itself in his sorcery, igniting the papers on the desk, crushing furniture to matchsticks and caving in the bathroom altogether; the chair sprouted legs, and wailing pathetically, tried to hide beneath the remains of the desk. **"Cowards!"** the King raved. **"All of you, pathetic feckless cowards!"**

Over the thud and crunch of the chaos around them, Glinda jeered, "If you want to talk about cowardism, let's just have a nice long chat about how you never had the guts to face me in the dreamworld as you really were-"

Invisible energies rippled through the air, flinging her backwards across the room- right towards the jagged mess of splinters that the desk had been reduced to. Seeing Glinda gently arcing through the air, Elphaba ducked under a hail of conjured blades and flung all her magical energies into catching her before she landed: there were no spells in this attempt, no incantations, just pure magical energy- the same kind that had once been only good for drawing her sister's wheelchair across the room. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Glinda slow in mid-air and gently settle to the ground just a few feet away from her, and briefly rejoiced...

Then, she heard the laughter overhead, and looked up to see the maelstrom of fire that was now forming in the Nome King's newly-grown hands. **"That's the second time in as many days that you've taken the bait,"** he growled hoarsely. **"If nothing else, it at least shows you care, I suppose. Let's see if it shows skeletons too**_**..."**_

And with that, a solid _wall_ of fire launched itself towards them. Elphaba had just enough time to realize that there'd be no time to fling herself to safety or to shield Glinda from the flames- right before something barrelled into her at high speed, yanking her off her feet and hauling her past the oncoming blaze. She heard another voice yelp in surprise, and looked up to see Glinda had been slung over their rescuer's shoulder as he'd passed.

Said rescuer was, of course, Basalt. He hastily set them back down on the ground on the opposite side of the room, well past the fire; unfortunately, he was now in full sight of the Nome King.

"**So,"** he rumbled. **"I knew there had to be a traitor in my ranks. How could Elphaba have gotten here without help? How else could she have known about the ritual?"** He sighed. **"I never imagined it would be you, though."**

"I _am_ sorry, Your Majesty," Basalt intoned, solemnly. "But when I learned of your plans, I could not disobey my oaths; I had to find a way to stop you somehow, and Miss Elphaba was the only option I had."

"**Your oaths demand that you serve me, Basalt..."**

"They also demand that I serve my people, Your Majesty. Could you have guaranteed your sanity or your mercy as a god? Would we all have fared as well as Lord Eldrect and his house?"

"**Well, your delusional logic aside, I'm glad you didn't turn to the War Council for help. It doesn't matter, now, though. If you intended on working in secrecy, you've failed."** An accommodating smile rudely forced its way onto the King's face.** "But am nothing if not a lenient ruler: I'll be happy to overlook this offence... so long as you demonstrate your loyalty by restraining these two."**

"So that you can kill them- or torture them into translating the Grimmerie? You know that, as Glinda's Protector, I cannot allow that. They are guests, not prisoners."

The smile twitched. **"Perhaps I should be a bit more distinct: Basalt, I **_**order**_** you to restrain these prisoners."**

There was a pause, noiseless except for the gentle whoosh of the desk exploding into flame- and a almost-inaudible rumbling from somewhere in the distance. And then, in that deathly silence, Basalt said, "No."

"**...What?"**

"I said, "no," Your Majesty."

"_**What?"**_

Elphaba started to laugh; suddenly, the Nome messenger's earlier reluctance made perfect sense. "Something tells me that you've only yourself to blame for this, Your Majesty."

"**Oh **_**shut it!"**_the King bawled- his yelling almost drowning out the sound of shifting rock from somewhere nearby. **"And you- your oaths and bonds are very clear: you cannot disobey a direct order from your King! Unless you've somehow forgotten everything about your pathetic existence in the last five seconds, it should be clear that I am your **_**king!**_**"**

"This is true," Basalt conceded. "But you aren't a Nome anymore, Your Majesty- not entirely anyway. Only a Nome King can control my bonds or those of my fellow Nomes."

For once, the King was at a loss for words.

"I _did_ say that you'd only yourself to blame," said Elphaba. "So, do you think the ritual was worth losing control of your army and your servants? Or is that another one of those odd little sacrifices you were willing to make for your masterplan?"

"**I haven't lost **_**anything!"**_

"Apart from Our Forefather's technique?"

"**...I'm sorry, what?"**

"You know that I read Our Forefather's book, Your Majesty," Basalt explained- just as much for Elphaba and Glinda's benefit as for the King's. "His technique was a spell crafted only for Nomes; just like our bonds of servitude, it can only be used by a Nome. You are still part-human... meaning that if we kill you, you will not be able to escape into another Nome. You will die once and for all."

This time, Elphaba saw the expression of naked horror appear on the King's face, and all but punched the air in triumph. Then she heard the rumbling sound again, and the floor shook violently- as if the King's emotions were now being expressed through the ground; a moment later, the look of mingled anger and bruised pride was back on his face. **"And how do you propose to kill me, Basalt? How can **_**any**_** of you pose a threat to me even now?"**

And as if in answering, the entire right-hand wall caved in.

Behind the collapsed masonry, a tunnel had inexplicably formed; because there were lights in the newly-dug passage, it was impossible to tell exactly what was out there, but it was clearly to anyone watching that there was _something_ lurking there in the shadows- and whatever it was, it was growling at the top of its voice. The King glared into the darkness, raising a hand that was a suddenly alive with magical energies, ready to blast the intruder to pieces.

Then things went slightly off-script: instead of charging, the thing emitted a loud metallic _clunk,_ and something four-legged and extremely noisy galloped into the half-light.

Glinda's jaw very slowly dropped. "What _in the..."_

Elphaba, meanwhile, was struggling not to laugh.

The intruder was none other than Javelin, painted fire-engine red and strung from horns to hooves with sleigh bells; leaping across the room in an elaborate hopping pattern, he bounced across the charred carpet and over the blazing furniture, spiralling closer and closer to the centre of the room. When he was within about two feet of the King (who now looked decidedly bamboozled by this turn of events) he stopped, dropped his sleigh bells, and yelled three words at the top of his voice:

"I'M A DISTRACTION!"

The King's gaze flitted back towards the hole in the wall, just in time for a salvo of rockets to slam into his torso; reeling from the explosions, he bellowed in pain as more missiles streaked out of the darkness and detonated against his body. For a moment, it looked as though the explosives would overcome him; then, he stood, the craters on his chest fading as he drew more rock into his body. **"SHOW YOURSELF!"** he roared furiously. **"WHO DARES TO CHALLENGE ROQUAT THE RED?"**

There was a pause, and then the War Engine trundled into the light.

All things considered, it was probably the ugliest thing the Wizard had ever built: cumbersome, boxy and inelegant, its body was little more than an iron oblong studded with rune plates. The treads looked even weirder than they had in production, for now they looked even larger than the body of the machine itself- as if they could just roll away on their own and leave the body stranded in the tunnel. The oversized drill and the pincers were equally grotesque: the first was just as clumsy and ill-fitted as the rest of the Engine- functional for the moment, but still undeniably crude; the pincers, though, now lashed the air as they went about shoving rocks and debris out of the Engine's path, and despite being little more than skeletal limbs protruding from the armour, those claws looked disturbingly _alive._

The only thing that stopped the machine from being almost entirely alien to Elphaba was the figures standing in the control turret: Woolwax, working the rocket launchers mounted on the railing; Rasp, awkwardly pointing a complicated-looking Nome firearm at the King; and in the pilot seat, Diggs himself.

They allowed the King a moment to take in this bizarre sight; then, Diggs raised a microphone to his lips, and boomed _"I AM OZ! THE GREAT... AND THE TERRIBLE!"_

Roquat's expression froze; then, his mouth open in a bestial scream of hatred, he attacked. There was no magic in this assault, no complicated spellcraft, no harnessing the energies of the Ruby Slippers; there wasn't even any kind of strategy involved. All the King did was put his head down and charge at full speed towards the War Engine, all his coherency and intelligence forgotten in the throes of unrestrained wrath.

Bellowing a war-cry of his own, Diggs grabbed the controls and hit the accelerators, sending the War Engine hurtling towards the oncoming Nome, drill whirring to life as it went. Elphaba caught a brief glimpse of Rasp and Woolwax hurriedly bracing themselves for impact, before the two behemoths collided head-on with an ear-shredding crash: the King, having underestimated the War Engine's speed and strength, was not only impaled on the machine's drill but actually yanked off his feet and dragged along with it as it continued its charge across the room. Bellowing in pain and frustration, he pummelled the flanks of the Engine with all his might, trying vainly to puncture the magically-reinforced hull; but the iron and the rune-plates held- just long enough for the machine to reach the opposite end of the cell.

The two of them slammed into the wall with an ear-splitting crunch of metal on stone, and Elphaba heard the drill whirr to life again; Diggs was obviously getting ready to finish the King off. But before it could work up enough speed to tear all the way through him, the King braced his arms against the wall- his elbows seamlessly melding with the stone and working their way under it. Then, just as it looked as though he was trying to escape, the entire wall shifted backwards.

No longer impaled on the drill, the King dodged the War Engine's next charge and tackled it from the side, grappling with the Engine's pincers with one hand and tearing into the ground beneath it with the other. Seconds later, the floor gave way, sending the two plummeting into the depths of the palace with a cacophony of bangs, crashes and thuds loud enough to alert every single Nome in the palace.

And as the sound of punching, kicking, drilling, magic spells being cast and expletives being shouted finally faded into the distance, Glinda asked, "What the hell just happened?"

Elphaba took few steps towards the hole in the ground, and immediately realised that she'd been holding Glinda's hand for the last two minutes. "I'll tell you later," she said absently. "Come on- we'd best catch up with them. Now, where did I leave that broom?"

* * *

Not for the first time that day, Diggs thanked everything sacred that he'd remembered to anchor himself to the pilot's seat before they'd set off, for as it turned out, Roquat wasn't in the mood to tackle the War Engine onto the floor below: instead, he'd catapulted itclean _through _the floor below, the floor below that, the wall of the next floor, and through the ceiling of the entrance hall- a good two hundred and fifty feet above the ground.

And for every last foot of that innard-churning drop through the palace, the War Engine was turning over and over and _over:_ upside down, on one side, then upright just in time to be turned on its side all over again. Diggs was certain that he threw up at one point- at the very point that they'd arrived in the entrance hall in fact- but he barely noticed: the sight of the Nome King clinging to top of the drill swearing diabolically and trying to claw his way into the hull, proved to be something of a distraction. It wasn't until he'd dislodged the struggling Nome that he made the mistake of actually looking down (or possibly up) and began to worry about what would happen when they finally hit the rapidly-approaching floor.

Thankfully, they landed upright and unharmed for the most part: they'd managed to _just_ miss the stairs or the railings that would have flipped the Engine on its side all over again, and crashed down upon the flat stretch of hall between the great staircase and the gateway. Meanwhile, just about everyone except for the worker operating the boiler had vomited during the fall, Woolwax had been bruised from being tossed around inside the cabin, and Rasp looked as though he was about to faint, but none of them had suffered any serious injuries.

Then, the Nome King landed with a crash.

For perhaps a moment, he lay motionlessly on the ground in front of them, a heap of broken stone limbs. Then, just when Diggs was beginning to think that the drop had killed him, the King very slowly sat up...

... and started to grow.

Back when Diggs had first attacked him, the King had only been able ten feet high and unable to get any taller without putting his head through the ceiling; his strength had also been pretty limited as well: true, his punches had been powerful enough to spin the War Engine around like the world's ugliest roulette wheel, they hadn't been enough to breach the hull.

Here, there was no shortage of space for the King to grow in- or strength to summon, for that matter.

Diggs took a very deep breath, and put the War Engine into reverse. "Brollan!" he shouted, over the sound of grinding gears and rubble crunching under the treads. "Secret weapon time!"

One of the hatches in the hull of the machine swung open with a clank, and Brollan surged outwards, shedding his cloak and dashing towards the Nome King completely unveiled. To say the least, Brollan's disfigured body was by far the most horrific thing that Diggs had ever witnessed- a rabid tangle of arms, legs, distended fingers and dagger-like spines, offset by too many jaws, far too many eyeballs and a lot of livid, purulent flesh. It was more than enough to make any human being sick, and if nothing else, it was certainly enough to shock the King.

He cleared the space between the War Engine and the slowly-growing King in the space of a few seconds, hurling himself bodily across the last couple feet towards Roquat's startled face; he landed on his collarbone, and began furiously clawing his way up the Nome's throat, closer and closer to his eyes, scratching and punching and even _biting_ the stone as he climbed- unbelievably, succeeding in ripping several chunks of rock off the body in the process. The King, now almost thirty feet tall and showing no signs of stopping, let out a deafening bellow of revulsion and tried to swat Brollan away, but the enraged ball of limbs and eyeballs that the Gilikin entrepreneur had become was far too nimble to be struck.

Indeed, most of Roquat's wild swings seemed to do more damage to him than anyone else: more than once, an open-handed blow that looked as though it would squash his assailant flat ended up smashing the Nome's chin off. Higher and higher Brollan crawled, having to cover more ground with every few feet the King grew- until he was almost directly over the right eye.

Unfortunately, it was that moment that the King regained enough presence of mind to use magic: energy lanced through the air, looping around Brollan's disfigured waist; he had just enough time to let out a multi-throated yelp of surprise before the noose tightened and sent him hurtling across the entrance hall. He crashed headlong into the railing of the third floor, and tumbled to a stop in a pile of rubble.

He didn't get up.

"Woolwax!" Diggs shouted urgently. "We're going to need more rockets!"

"**What's the matter?"** the King slurred. **"I thought you'd finally grown a spine, your Ozness."**

"WOOLWAX, ROCKETS! NOW!"

"**You're not going to be the one to stop me, Pinhead; your little toys break so very easily..."**

Woolwax finally hauled himself from the cabin, brandishing the reloaded launchers; alongside him, Rasp awkwardly clambered onto the firing platform with his GraniteSlicer. As one, they opened fire. Unfortunately, the King was now well over a hundred and fifty feet tall and far too heavily built for the rockets or the gunfire to do any kind of serious damage.

"TRY AIMING FOR HIS HEAD!" Diggs shouted helpfully.

"GIVE ME SOME BLOODY TIME TO RELOAD!" Woolwax roared, and ducked back inside the cabin. Pausing only to fire a couple of parting shots at the all-too-distant King's face, Rasp hurriedly followed.

Swearing furiously, Diggs hit the accelerators and sent the War Engine charging towards the Nome King's mountainous bulk; he wasn't expecting to do any serious damage, but with any luck, he'd buy Woolwax and Rasp some time to get their weapons loaded.

However, Roquat was ready this time: the War Engine was barely ten feet away from its target when the King's fist shot out of the ground, tossing the machine across the entrance hall. Once again, they landed heavily, and this time Diggs heard something _crack_ loudly in the Engine's treads; hastily turning in his seat, he saw that somewhere between the King's uppercut and the second crash-landing, one of the treads had broken, leaving their glorious War Engine effectively paralysed.

As if to add insult to injury, the King followed this up by reaching down and _ripping_ the drill off the Engine's prow.

"**How little things change," **he said, flinging it aside. He sounded a little calmer now, but there was no mistaking the bloodlust in his voice. **"So... how to end this sad little charade, I wonder?"**

He leaned closer. **"Funny thing, Pinhead: after a whole year finding all the ways to make you scream, I honestly can't decide how to kill you. Do you have any ideas?"**

"None," said Diggs quietly. In spite of himself, he smiled.

"**Care to share the joke, Pinhead?"**

"Of course: you're very easily distracted."

Roquat's eyes widened; he looked up just in time for Elphaba's first hex to detonate against his torso, shattering his colossal arms and neatly shearing off his jaw.

As the King reared back, trying furiously to regenerate and retaliate at the same time, Elphaba continued the assault; she was now astride her broomstick, and almost glowing with magic. Glinda, meanwhile, was clinging to Elphaba's back and occasionally flinging a few deadly spells of her own. For thirty seconds, they soared back and forth across the hall, peppering Roquat with magical blasts that tore his body apart; but the attack couldn't be sustained forever: the King was very careful to protect his face now that someone was in danger of actually hitting it, and the hall wasn't wide enough to allow Elphaba to fly freely.

So, she descended.

"**You really are pushing your luck, child,"** the King snarled, as Elphaba and Glinda hastily clambered off the broomstick. **"This is your final warning: surrender and I might consider leniency-"**

"_No,"_ said Elphaba coldly. A faint aura of emerald-green light now surrounded her, as magic slowly filled the air around her. "You wasted so much time trying to tell me just how unlimited I really am; you told me that I should never have lost confidence in myself; you even brought out the Ruby Slippers as evidence. And guess what? I believe you... _and I'm not going to let you stop me now!"_

Blinding green light tore through the entrance hall: behind the shimmering green incandescence, Diggs could just about discern the sight of the King furiously drawing more rock into his body, trying desperately to rebuild his body even as Elphaba went on tearing it to pieces. After twelve seconds, the King finally counterattacked, reaching out with one arm- glowing cherry-red from the onslaught to launch a fireball at his tormentor. But to Diggs' amazement, she only banished the rock-melting light long enough to bat the fireball aside.

"Oh, so you've finally gotten it into your head to use magic again?" she shouted. "Come on then! You've been alive for thousands of years- let's see what you've learned in all that time!"

The two minutes were a blur of spells being hurled back and forth across the hall; occasionally Glinda, Woolwax or Rasp would duck into the fray to lend a helping hand, but there was no mistaking the fact that this stage of the battle was to be held exclusively between Elphaba and Roquat. In the end, they could only keep their distance as the chaos of the wizard's duel played out before them. To Digg's embarrassment, most of it was almost incomprehensible to him given how little he really knew about magic, but he did his best to keep up with the flow- if only so he could describe what happened on the off chance that he managed to escape.

As such, this was what he witnessed:

Fire blossomed in the air in front of Elphaba, shaping itself into two enormous arms that punched and pummelled the King's body, melting huge patches of stone as they worked their way up to his face; the King opened his mouth and vomited a thick stream of frost that extinguished the arms before they could reach his head- before sending the torrent in his opponent's direction; Elphaba tore a huge chunk of rock from the ground and used it as shield- before flinging it right at Roquat's face; the King shattered it with a single gesture, and sent the pieces hurtling back, along with a crackling mass of electricity. Elphaba deflected it with another flash of brilliant emerald light, before yelling an incantation that shook the ground and sent eight-foot-deep cracks racing across the ground towards the King; laughing derisively, he absorbed the tremors with one hand, and with the other sent a massive swarm of metal-skinned insects buzzing towards Elphaba, their needle-sharp stingers glistening with venom; Elphaba gathered a thick cloud of foul-smelling vapour in her hands and launched it at the King, dissolving the hornets along the way; once again, Roquat let his hands take the brunt of it, allowing his stone to ooze to the floor- where the molten rock was instantly moulded into a squad of ugly little golems that immediately marched in Elphaba's direction, menacingly waving their dagger-like appendages as they approached; she automatically swept the crude figures aside with a wave of invisible force...

As far as Diggs could see, all of this occurred within the first thirty seconds. Though he was unfamiliar with magic, it was clear that while the King was obviously the more experienced of the two, his rage was making it harder and harder for him to control his powers: more than once, a lightning bolt sparked and died in Roquat's hand, and he'd spent the next few seconds trying to regain control, eyes clenched shut and brow furrowed with concentration. But it was also clear that while Elphaba had more than enough raw power to match her opponent move by move, she clearly didn't have the King's resilience: she was beginning to tire; her breath now emerged in short, ragged gasps, and there was a cut on her cheek from where she'd only _just_ managed to dodge a hail of scything blades.

And then, just as he was starting to wonder what would happen next, Diggs saw a dark shape oozing along the floor towards Elphaba, its long curling fingers curling out to grab at her legs. It wasn't until he took a close look at the long umbilicus snaking back across the floor to his feet that Diggs realized that it was his shadow, somehow moving against the light; and it wasn't the only one in the room- all across the entrance hall, shadows were turning away from their owners and slithering towards Elphaba. Almost as one, they seized her, grabbing her by her arms and legs with their rubbery, tendril-like limbs and holding her in place.

Cursing himself for not recognizing the spell or noticing the smirk on the King's face, Diggs made a grab for for the nearest rocket launcher... only to have it promptly swatted out of his hand by a blast of magic; he tried to rise from the pilot's seat, but the harness only tightened with every attempt to release. Woolwax dived for his own array of launchers, and was immediately blasted off his feet and into the depths of the War Engine; before he could recover, the hatch slammed shut trapping both him and Rasp inside. Glinda took careful aim with her wand, clearly ready to sever the tails of the shadows, but it seemed the King wasn't prepared to let anyone interfere: Diggs saw Glinda suddenly double over at the waist, as if she'd been punched in the stomach; another twinge of force sent her careening across the hall, to land in a battered heap just inches away from the stairs. Wheezing, she scrabbled for a handhold on the marble floor even as the King's magic held her down.

Meanwhile, the King himself now held the War Engine's drill, and was taking careful aim at the immobilized figure of Elphaba below him.

"**For what it's worth,"** he growled, **"I didn't want it to be this way. Goodbye, Elphaba."**

And with that, he flung the drill.

In slow motion, Diggs saw the jagged missile hurtling towards Elphaba; he knew that it would hit her- even with the King as angry as he was, there was no chance of him missing her, not with magic steering the drill towards her. And in that moment, all his uncertainty, all his fear, all his cowardice seemed to evaporate as one single thought occupied his mind: he had to save Elphaba; the chance to save his daughter was sitting right in front of him, and he couldn't let it slip through his fingers- he had to do something. _Anything-_ even if he could only scream insults.

Actually, that wasn't all he couldn't do. True, he might be utterly immobilized; true, he wasn't all that mobile to begin with anyway; yes, his weapons were well and truly out of reach; and to be brutally honest, despite all his bluff and bluster over the last few years, he was a magical ignoramus. But he did know one spell- and now that he had a serious use for it, the words flowed quicker and clearer than any other point since he'd learned them:

Focussing every last atom of his concentration at stopping the incoming drill, he shouted_ "Ferruseld_ _Magnetifus Estrallivar __VEKT!"_

Diggs hadn't the faintest idea how he'd managed to say those words without stuttering, but somehow, he'd done it: the drill was now hovering in the air less than three feet from Elphaba's face... and best of all, the King was staring at him with a look of utter incredulity.

"**You... used... magic?"**

By way of evidence, Diggs tossed the drill aside with another flicker of magical power. Hopefully, he wouldn't have to demonstrate it again; after only a few seconds of focussing his willpower on spellcasting, he was already suffering a massive headache.

There was an enraged silence, and then the King finally spoke again- this time in a voice so marinated in loathing that Diggs only just stopped himself from panicking at the memories that horrible voice conjured. **"Twenty years in the presence of real magic,"** he seethed,** "two whole decades you were happy to spend on fakeries and lies... and now, **_**just now, **_**of all times you learned how to use magic? You couldn't have tried at any other... **_**fucking**_**...time..."** He stopped, trying to gather the last remaining fragments of his composure, without much success: the shadows holding Elphaba in place began to wither away, flattening back into ordinary shadows; Diggs' harness loosened, allowing him to move again; the War Engine's hatch finally popped open, releasing Rasp and Woolwax; and Glinda slowly rose from the floor, readying her wand.

"**You,"** the King muttered, twitching madly with the effort of remaining calm. **"You could have been a real Wizard if you'd bothered... we could've avoided all this... grrr... fff... rrrrrrr... RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AARRRRGHHH!"**

Suddenly, he was in motion; the ground shook and great chunks of rubble fell from the ceiling as the giant Nome lunged towards Elphaba, one titanic arm stretched out towards her. Glinda, Woolwax and Rasp tried desperately to stop him, blasting the oncoming leviathan with every single weapon they had at hand, but the King was beyond noticing the danger; his fingers closed around Elphaba's body, pulling her into the air- towards the King's open mouth.

* * *

Hanging upside down almost a hundred and fifty feet above the ground, Elphaba found herself wondering- rather abstractly -what being eaten by the Nome King would be like; all things considered, it would probably hurt considerably less than being slowly melted, so at least she could take some comfort in that. But that would only be the case if he bit her head off- what if he just swallowed her whole? What were Nome stomachs like?

The King's cavernous jaws yawned open before her, and the more practical half of Elphaba's brain politely notified her that it might be a good idea to do something, especially considering that the others didn't appear to be having much success in getting the King to let go. From what little she could see from here, they appeared to have stopped for the moment, presumably because the point they _really_ wanted to hit was much too close to her.

But Glinda was still shrieking at them to press the attack, to stop him, to save her, to do _something..._ and the sound galvanized Elphaba into action. She knew what to do now- for in his rage, the King had made the mistake of bringing her up to eye-level.

Ignoring the clenching pressure on her feet, she summoned all the power she could, letting the luminescent green energy surround her for a moment, and then hurled one last bolt of magic...

... right into the Nome King's left eye.

There was a loud and faintly watery explosion, the King's head suddenly reared back as if in surprise, and then without warning, Elphaba found herself _falling_ through a vast cloud of metallic-smelling red mist. On the upside, it was immediately clear that she wasn't falling into the King's open mouth; the downside was that she was now plummeting towards the floor.

She tried to summon her broomstick, to cast a spell, to do anything, but she couldn't get a good look at what she was doing, or even what direction she was currently facing- not that it would have done any good; by the time she'd have been able to clamber aboard the broom, she'd have hit the floor.

And then, perhaps fifty feet below her, she heard Glinda shouting, "I've got you! I've got you..." and suddenly, Elphaba was no longer falling; she was now floating on a controlled descent towards the floor. She landed gently on her feet, dizzy, sprayed from head to toe in Nome-Human hybrid blood, but very much alive.

Overhead, the King began to scream.

This somehow outdid all the roars and bellows and warcries he'd uttered in the last few hours in volume: this was a solid _wall_ of noise that threw itself at the eardrums of everyone in the entrance hall, shattering glass and blasting dirt from flat surfaces as it reverberated madly around the room. Everyone recoiled in pain, clamping their hands over their ears in a desperate attempt to shut out the noise- to no avail: even with their ears firmly blocked, the noise still somehow made itself heard. Even the Nomes amassing on the landings far above them looked a bit discomforted by the sound.

The scream went on for almost twenty seconds, coming virtually out of nowhere and ending almost as suddenly. In the ringing silence that followed it, Elphaba tentatively lowered her hands from her ears and glanced upwards- only to find herself staring into the Nome King's enraged scowl; his left eye had been reduced to a bloody crater, the jagged edge of his eyesocket strung with lengths of shredded tissue and other less identifiable things. And best of all, judging from the random flickerings of magic around the gaping socket, this was probably the only wound that the King couldn't heal.

"How's becoming a human being working out for you?" she asked blearily.

"**YOU FUCKING BITCH!"** he roared down at her, clutching his ruined eyesocket in pain. **"FUCKING JADE-SKINNED **_**WHORE!**_** UNGRATEFUL FUCKING FUCKING FUCKING **_**FUCKING..."**_

He let out a snarl of mingled pain and anger, and began backing towards the gates, swinging his fists into the walls in a blind (or half-blind, more accurately) rage. **"GUARDS! RIP THEM APART!"'**

* * *

The battle that followed the Nome King's departure from the hall was brief and to the point: because the King's voice didn't carry nearly as much clout as it used to, the platoon of guards that surrounded them looked uncertain to say the least; most of them barely knew what to make of their opponents, and the others- those who'd actually been watching the spectacle from the landings- were clearly terrified.

They put up the best fight possible under the circumstances, but after being beaten up, dosed with sedatives, coated with hybrid blood and dropped over a hundred feet, Elphaba barely noticed what happened between the charge and the retreat; she was honestly too tired and disoriented to make any kind of objective analysis. The most she remembered were snapshots of the unfolding chaos around her:

She saw Glinda slashing the air with her wand, shattering Nome guards into gravel; Javelin emerging from the wall with Basalt, leaping among the ranks of the Nomes and drawing their eyes away from their attackers; Woolwax bounding across the hall, swinging a sledgehammer twice as tall as he was; Brollan, bloodied and crooked-limbed but still alive, lurching upright and attacking the guards in a frenzy; she even saw Rasp shooting a guard at point-blank range with his rifle and blasting it to pieces. But the strangest sight of all was Basalt leading an entire team of Nome workers in lifting the disabled War Engine, turning it towards attackers so Diggs could take them out with the pincers.

Before long, the surviving guards were on the run- along with most of the other Nomes that had stayed to watch- leaving Elphaba and the others alone in the wreckage of the entrance hall.

Nobody could say anything at first; most of them were out of breath, and those who weren't clearly had no idea what could possibly be said. Even cheering seemed a bit beyond any of them; after all, it _felt_ as if they'd achieved some kind of victory, but even they had, what were they going to do next?

For at least a minute, they sat in silence, trying to get to grips with everything that had just happened to them; once or twice, Rasp would raise a hand, as if to say something, but almost immediately lapsed back into silence.

Then, Glinda stood, turned in Elphaba's direction, and slowly began to walk towards her.

_Here we go,_ Elphaba thought. _She's probably going to hit me- not that I don't deserve it._ She stood, clambering awkwardly to her feet; if nothing else, she'd be able to take her comeuppance with a brave face.

"Am I dead?" Glinda asked softly.

Elphaba blinked. "No, you're very much alive- you weren't even injured in the battle, by the looks of things."

"Then... I'm not still dreaming, am I? You're real, aren't you?" There was a desperate, pleading edge to her voice now.

This time, Elphaba could only nod. "I know you don't want to believe what I told you back in the dreamworld," she said, once she'd recovered her voice. "I understand- you don't want to believe that I betrayed y-"

"You didn't."

"Look, I told you the details- I abandoned you, I-"

"_You didn't!"_ Glinda shrieked. She let out a choked sob: "I listened to what you said, Elphaba... and no matter how you look at it, I can't call it betrayal. You wanted to keep me safe when you faked your death- you even trusted me to carry on your work... and how did I repay it? _I failed!_ I screwed up from beginning to end! I was a terrible ruler, I barely changed anything for the Animals, and in the end, I was so bad at my job that I got thrown out and replaced. I stayed on to defend Oz, and I failed in my duties _on the very first day!_ On my watch, the Emerald City was destroyed and its people were killed or petrified- the flying monkeys are all _dead_ because I wasn't smart enough to see the spell building up!" She was sobbing freely now, taking in deep shuddering breaths in a vain attempt to steady herself. "And what did I do after that?" she asked nobody in particular. "I got myself captured. You think you betrayed me? I betrayed you and all of Oz by agreeing to work for the King! And all it took for me to throw away my principles was-"

"-the chance to see me again," Elphaba finished. "That would never have happened if-"

"-if I hadn't been such a selfish little cow!" Glinda wailed. "And that's all I am in the end! Stupid, selfish, and useless... and oh gods, I should never have thought I was anything else than that! That was how the King _really _got me to work for him, by pretending to be you and... and _flattering me!_ That's all it took to get me to turn traitor- five minutes of paying lip service to my ego, telling me that I was innocent, that I was worth something!"

There was a deathly silence.

"How can you trust me after all that?" she whimpered. "How can you think I've changed a bit since our days at Shiz?"

"Because you _have,"_ said Elphaba simply. "Would the Galinda I met all those years ago have managed even half of the magic I've seen you work today? Would she have been able to save my life? Would she have bothered? And what about everything that's happened in the last few days- all that time you spent translating the Grimmerie? I saw all the work you did, the meals you'd forgotten to eat- I even saw you asleep at your desk. I certainly can't see Galinda doing that, can you?

In spite of herself, Glinda smiled through her tears. "I doubt it. Some things never change, though; I'm still nowhere near as good a witch as you."

"I think you punish yourself for things you can't possibly be blamed for."

"And I still don't understand- how can you forgive me after everything I've done?"

Elphaba took a very deep breath. "I was about to ask you the same question," she admitted, blinking rapidly.

"I... Elphaba, are you _crying?"_

She couldn't trust herself to speak; instead, without saying another word, Elphaba stepped forward and flung her arms around Glinda.

* * *

A/n: Whew. That was an eventful chapter, and I hope you enjoyed it. Incidentally, for those of you wondering what the hell I was thinking when I wrote in the eyeball trauma, it's actually in response to something I noticed on repeat viewings of Return to Oz: after Dorothy starts winning the game, the Nome King's left eyeball mysteriously vanishes. For a while, I thought it was because he simply ended up accidentally crushing it during his return to Nome form... then I started writing this chapter.

What can I say? I'm a very twisted individual.


	35. Final Gambits

A/N: This latest chapter actually started out as part of the previous one; but alas, there was honestly too much happening back there for me to include it. So, here we have the continuation! I hope it doesn't feel too rushed, and I hope you enjoy it, ladies and gentlemen.

GoodWitchesOfOz: No, Roquat's not dead yet; as for what happens now... well, just wait and see.

Inbalwolf: Once again, I offer a massive, grovelling apology for not including the Fiyero/Elphaba reunion; I couldn't put it in this chapter, because quite frankly, this chapter is made up of the previous chapter's overflow and once again, there's too much going on. I just feel I need to give the reunion more space to work rather than just tacking it onto the end; hopefully by doing this, I can make sure the event won't be as overshadowed as it would be here- ie: by part 2 of the final battle. Plus, I've still got a few on-screen events from Return to Oz to deal with. I thank you for your kind review and beg your indulgence for just a little longer- but rest assured that you most definitely won't need to kiss any feet.

CTN: Thank you so much for your review; I'm glad I was able to provide a suitable birthday gift, and I'm equally glad you enjoy how things are going. Your kind words are much appreciated.

Disclaimer: I don't own Wicked, Wizard of Oz, Return to Oz, the Oz books, and certainly not Oz itself.

* * *

It took a long time for Elphaba to finally stop crying; she didn't know or care how long she stood there, cradled in Glinda's arms, releasing all her pent-up guilt and sorrow in a flood of tears. At that point, the passage of minutes was virtually non-existent to her; all she cared about was staying in the presence of the friend she'd thought she'd never see again. Much like Glinda had a moment ago, she needed to be assured that this reunion wasn't just part of some cruelly beautiful dream that she'd soon awake from.

Glinda, for the most part, just held her- even though she was still soaked to the skin with the Nome King's blood and ocular fluid, along with all the dirt and grime she'd accumulated over the past week. Once again, Elphaba marvelled at how much her old friend had changed since she'd last seen her: braver, stronger, cleverer... and so much more haggard than before, she realized with a thrill of horror; taking in Glinda's tired eyes, bony frame and tattered clothing, it brought on a fresh wave of tears as she realized once again just how far she'd been driven in translating the Grimmerie.

Eventually, though, her breathing began to slow and Elphaba gradually stopped crying. She looked up, and realised that Glinda was looking at her with an expression of utter amazement.

"What's wrong?" she asked.

"It's... that's the first time I've ever seen you cry," Glinda admitted. "I mean, by the time we left Shiz, I just thought crying was something I'd never see you do. I suppose it's been that kind of week, though- impossible things seem to have been happening left and right..." She laughed, and then her eyes narrowed as she finally seemed to notice the figures that were gathered around them. "And while we're on the subject of impossible things, who are all _these _people?"

"These are... they're the nearest thing to an army I could find at short notice. Well, part of it, anyway. The moment I heard that the Emerald City had been attacked, I flew over to see what had happened- and I got shot down by a gang of refugees. Once we'd gotten over the fact that we hated each other's guts, we decided to try and take on the Nome King; these four here-"

"Ten," Brollan corrected, his multi-throated voice making Glinda jump.

Elphaba rolled her eyes, and continued: "These _ten_ here are all that's left of them."

The four (or possibly ten) each introduced themselves- Woolwax a tad more enthusiastically than the others. Glinda clearly had no idea what to make of them: Brollan could scarcely be mistaken for a human being even at a distance, Rasp was still heavily bandaged and currently using his rifle as an improvised crutch, and Javelin sported both a broken horn and a fresh coating of red paint. Next to all these oddities on display, Woolwax's slightly manic grin and overly-eager handshake looked quite normal, all things considered.

Her gaze shifted in the direction of the War Engine, where Diggs was slowly being helped down from the pilot's seat. "What about him?" she asked, her voice suddenly turning cold and unsympathetic.

"Nice to see you, too," Diggs grunted. "I'd have thought you'd be a little more welcoming, considering I just saved your life."

"Really? Oz is lying in ruins because of you, "Wizard"- how happy _should_ I be at this point? And another thing- how the hell did you get here?"

Elphaba coughed loudly. "He's been imprisoned since he left Oz last year," she explained. "I only met him again yesterday- apparently the King wanted me to execute him. Once we got over the usual teething troubles you'd expect from being locked up in this hellhole, he designed this iron-clad monstrosity here to help us fight the Nome King."

There was a pause, as the expressions on Glinda's face swung between shock and disbelief. "You _really _trust him?"

"More or less. He seems willing to atone for what he's done in the past." In a much lower tone of voice, she added, "And even if he's lying about that, it's still pretty obvious he wants to escape from the palace, so we've got that on our side."

"But Elphaba, he's..." Suddenly, it was Glinda's turn to lower her voice to a whisper. "There's something you need to know, something I found out just after you mel- after you faked your death: he's _your father._ Now, I know you probably don't want to believe that, but-"

"I know," Elphaba gently interjected, "And I didn't want to believe it when he told me, but he had some pretty incontrovertible evidence in his favour."

"Wh... whu... you _know? _How- why- wha..." She floundered for a moment or two, gesticulating aimlessly about the room.

"Are you alright?"

"I... I'm fine- I will be in a minute," mumbled Glinda, still looking frantically about her. "There- there's just so much going on that I honestly didn't have the faintest idea about, and... it's going to take ages just to get to all of it..." Eventually, she turned in the direction of the resident Nome, the expression of confusion on her face deepening as she looked him up and down. "I mean, just take _you: _not to sound ungratefullating, Basalt, but since when did you decide to rebel against the Nome King?"

"I had been considering it for some time, Miss Glinda; suffice to say, I had found evidence of a conspiracy- political assassinations, mass graves on the outskirts of Oz, records of unpleasant events- and all of it led back to the King. However, I only made my decision after Miss Elphaba arrived in the palace."

"So you knew she was alive _all along?"_

Basalt shuffled uncomfortably, the ghost of a sheepish expression drifting across his otherwise blank face. "I had actually discovered this before the second assassination attempt, Miss Glinda," he admitted. "I found her while investigating a mass grave in the ruins of Munchkinland- or more accurately, _she_ found me first, and mistook me for a spy. The first meeting went badly, to say the least."

"So that's why you said you'd _still _be considered an enemy- you weren't guessing at all!" For the first time since the dream world, Glinda actually looked hurt. "Why didn't you tell me?"

For several seconds, the Nome's face twitched with the effort of deciding a suitable response. "... I didn't know if you'd believe me," he said at last. "I didn't even know if you would be willing to hear what little evidence I'd managed to gather. By the time concrete proof was in reach, I was being watched by the Nome King's spies; even after I managed to escape them, I still couldn't tell you in case something went wrong. I wanted to tell you, but the nearest I could do was hint- to imply that..." He trailed off.

"Before this day is over, you will see Elphaba alive again," Glinda mused aloud, as if quoting. "You have a point," she sighed. The look of disappointment on her face didn't fade, however.

"Are you... angry with me?" Basalt inquired softly.

"No, no... It's just that- I didn't expect everyone to be keeping so many secrets, that's all. And everyone's been doing so many things _for_ me, and I've barely done anything of any notabilitude in the last few days." She smiled weakly. "Just... just promise me that the two of you can explain everything that's happened once we're out of here."

"Of course," said Elphaba. Basalt wordlessly bowed his head in agreement.

Taking this as a cue to gather around and discuss strategy, the others drew closer- Diggs and Rasp taking slightly longer than others. However, just as Elphaba was turning in their direction, Glinda leaned in close and whispered, "You're here to stay, aren't you? You're not going to vanish as soon as all this is over and done with, right?" Her voice was pleading, almost _begging._ "You won't leave me like before, will you?"

"I'm not going anywhere."

"You promise?"

"Glinda, I've spent almost a week getting here, and every hour of it I've been worrying that you'd hate me for leaving you behind the last time: I'm not going to abandon you again. I _promise _you- once we're out of the palace and back in Oz, I'll be with you no matter what happens to the group."

And then, just as a relieved smile was gently playing out across Glinda's features, Basalt politely cleared his throat. "Would you permit me to accompany you?" he whispered.

Glinda looked puzzled. "What, back to Oz?"

"Yes, Miss Glinda."

"But I thought you wanted to keep being promoted and learn about emotions! I mean, do you really want to leave all that behind?"

"No- I do want to stay here among my fellow Nomes, just as I want to achieve all that you have suggested... but that may no longer be an option: by openly supporting you, I am now known as a traitor; I would not be welcome in Nome society even if we succeed in killing the King. But I still have my duties to attend you, and if you so desire, then I would gladly continue to serve as your Protector."

"Basalt, you're not really a traitor; I mean, I don't see why you'd be called one for standing against that maniac, and now that he's no longer a Nome, I don't think anyone's really going to listen to what _he's_ going to say-"

"The guards in the last fight did: their expressions were proof of my current standing; they saw me only as an enemy- as an ally of Oz in all but species. There is no place for me in the Nome Dominions anymore, Miss Glinda; Oz- and my duties as Protector- are all that I have left. I will understand if you feel that other survivors will not trust me-"

"They won't trust Elphaba, either," said Glinda, her voice suddenly cold and resolute. "To _hell_ with what they think; you're welcome to join us anytime you like- the more the merrier, I say."

Once again, Basalt inclined his head in thanks.

In the awkward silence that followed, the three of them realized that the rest of the group had started the strategy conference without them, and hastily separated.

"...question is, where's the bastard run off to?" Woolwax was grumbling. "Do you think he's bled to death?"

"Probably not," said Diggs. "He might have a few human organs about him, but he's still almost entirely Nome: you'll have to smash him to pieces and grind every piece down to dust to kill him for good- unless you've got some eggs with you."

"Eggs?"

"It's their weakness- I'll explain more about it later..."

"We've got a hen in the palace," said Elphaba brightly. "Trouble is, it's likely been transformed along with Pumpkinhead, and I don't know if Dorothy's found a way to restore him yet."

"Wait, _what?"_

There was a brief interlude, as Elphaba and Basalt hastily explained to Glinda just why Dorothy was in the palace. "There's another problem," Diggs added, as the thirty-second rundown came to a close. "Even if this hen really is alive and untransformed at the moment, you can't just expect her to lay an egg on demand."

"Well, if Nomes are really that scared of eggs, we can still use the chicken to threaten him into submissification," Glinda suggested. She sighed, and added, "I cannot believe I just said that."

"Whatever we do," said Basalt solemnly, "I recommend we do so quickly. Dorothy is still playing her part in the ritual: if she succeeds in returning all the participants to normal before we can stop the King for good, he will undoubtedly become a Nome again."

"In other words, you and the other Nomes won't be able to resist his orders anymore, right?"

"Worse than that, Miss Glinda. It means that he will be able to use our Forefather's technique again: even if we destroy his body, he'll be able to live on through any Nome close enough to be claimed by his spirit. It may very well be impossible to kill him."

There was an ominous silence, broken only by the clunking footsteps of a worker hurrying up to them, clutching something battered and dust-smothered in its arms; the Nome bowed, handed its unidentifiable cargo to Basalt, whispered something into his ear, bowed again, and scurried away.

Basalt studied it for a moment, and then held it out for the group's inspection. "Apparently, the King dropped this on his way out," he said.

Elphaba was the first to recognize it- and the first to smile. "Lo and behold," she said gleefully, "We have our trump card." She reached out, and swept away the thick coating of dust from its surface, revealing the familiar leather-bound cover of the Grimmerie.

And then without warning, an colossal explosion shook the palace, hurling everyone but Basalt to the floor. As they awkwardly struggled to their feet, Elphaba felt magic rippling out through the walls- as if a spell had just collapsed somewhere. But whatever the spell was, it wasn't what had caused the tremors that were still racing through the buildings: no, the source of that was far below them, probably down in...

"The ornament collection," Elphaba hissed. "Basalt, we need to get down there _now!"_

* * *

"_**STOP!"**_the King bellowed. _**"STOP!"**_

The ornament collection lay in ruins: the earthquake had done its part in tumbling vases and statuettes from the shelves, and most of the other objects had been smashed to pieces by the collapsing roof. They now layered the floor in a colourful pattern of broken crockery and glass, speckled with gemstones and precious metals; looking down at the rubble spreading across the floor, Dorothy could only thank God that they'd managed to save Jack's ornament (a large green vase) before it hit the ground. But now that he stood with them, the last few feet of wall was slowly crumbling away, revealing a massive cavern lit by constant jets of flame roaring up from the chasms below. And standing right in the middle of that hellish landscape was the Nome King, now at least two hundred feet tall; almost all of his human features had returned to stone, making him more like a man-shaped volcano than anything else. The only thing that remained was one livid, blazing eye; the other was gone, leaving an empty socket ablaze with lava.

Brushing shards of shattered porcelain out of her hair, Dorothy allowed Scarecrow and Jack to help her upright as the Nome King's demands for them to stop continued. "We haven't finished guessing yet!" she shouted desperately, backing away from the boiling-hot winds that now swept towards them. "You said if we guessed correctly-"

"**I'M TIRED OF GAMES,"** the King thundered. **"I'M TIRED OF ALL OF YOU!"**

_And you were lying, of course,_ Dorothy thought wearily. _I should be used to that by now, I suppose._

The King's one-eyed gaze flicked from person to person, as if sizing them up for a challenge: eventually, he settled on the Gump. **"WHY DOESN'T THE SOFA... GO... FIRST?"** he boomed.

An arm that could have been easily mistaken for a stretch of road gone horribly wrong snaked out towards them- towards the horrified Gump; the mismatched creature tried to hurry away from the King's snatching fingers, but with his clumsy sofa body, he could only amble sluggishly towards the safety of the corridor. Indeed, all he managed to do was stop the King from grabbing him by the head when those column-like fingers finally reached him- and began dragging him across the floor.

Dorothy lunged forward, seizing the Gump by his front; she knew it wasn't going to even slow the King down, but she couldn't just let him claim his victim now. Jack and the Scarecrow joined her, and soon all three of them were hauling him back across the room by the armrest.

Then, the King drew his hand back _hard_, wrenching the sofa body almost completely out of their grasp: the only thing that stopped the Gump from being dragged away altogether was the fact that Jack and the Scarecrow had been holding him by the antlers instead of the armrest; with a loud pop of ropes giving way, the Gump's head came loose and landed in Scarecrow's outstretched hands. Still alive (or at the very least, still animated), the disembodied head could only watch in horror as its body was lowered into the Nome King's volcanic jaws and swallowed whole.

"**NEXT!" **the King roared. **"PUMPKINHEAD!"**

"Run!" Dorothy shouted, and before she'd gotten halfway through the word, all three of them were running back down the passageway- the Gump's head still clutched in Scarecrow's arms.

Above them, the King's bellowed another warcry: **"NOMES! **_**TO ME!"**_

* * *

"Goddamn," Diggs muttered. "I don't think I've ever seen him this angry..."

Elphaba and the others had just arrived in the ornament collection by its south entrance, several thousand feet away from the King's rampage. From her position atop the staircase that descended into the collection, she could see the gargantuan King tearing his way through the walls of the palace, searching for something amidst the chaos of the collection. Because her viewpoint further into the maze of collapsing walls was blocked, it wasn't entirely clear what he was looking for, but judging by the distant yells and screams, Elphaba could easily guess: Dorothy was somewhere down there, and the King was seeking her out on some mad vengeful whim.

And then they heard the King shouting for reinforcements; for a moment, it looked as though there'd be no response- up until Basalt saw the shapes of Nomes flowing through the rock walls towards them. These weren't standard palace guards, but soldiers called back from the army that had been amassing at the border, and Basalt pointed out, they probably wouldn't scare so easily.

As they swarmed into the depths of the collection, herding Dorothy and the others through the passages like dogs herding sheep, a few stragglers on the outskirts of the collection happened to turn the direction of the south entrance- and saw Elphaba and the others filing in. Screeching an alarm, they charged towards them.

The first one to reach the foot of the stairs was brought up short by Woolwax, who was still armed with a sledgehammer; Brollan swarmed in after him, claws and tendrils waving; even Basalt joined them, battering the attacking soldiers with clumsy but powerful blows from his stone fists. With Rasp sniping more incoming Nomes and Diggs trying to coordinate the workers dragging the War Engine down the stairs, that left Elphaba and Glinda poring over the Grimmerie, trying to find something that could kill the King for good.

"How many spells from this do you know?" Elphaba asked hurriedly, as she leafed through the book.

"Not many; it's hard getting the specifitations of a spell down when you've got government work to do."

"Just tell me what- it doesn't matter!"

"Well, I know a few spells for healing, a few basic transmutations and transfigurations, but that about it."

Elphaba sighed furiously. "Never mind; we're going to need something much more powerful than any of that- the most destructive spells in this book." She frantically turned towards the later chapters, occasionally glancing up at the King, hoping that he hadn't been able to catch Dorothy yet. "We're going to need things I didn't even consider using when I was still the Wicked Witch of the West!" she added, just for emphasis sake.

"Well hurry up!" Woolwax bellowed, smashing a Nome soldier's face into gravel. "I can't feel my arms."

"Give me time, give me time!" Elphaba screamed. She turned back to the book, flicking wildly through the last hundred pages and skimming from one impossibly powerful spell to the next: "Sunlight's beam- no. Golden Enshrinement- no. Crown of Flame- no. Verminous dissolution- dear gods, _no._ Aha!" She stopped at long last. "Seismic conflagration!"

"What does that do?" Glinda asked.

"Put simply, a very big explosion, enough to shatter mountains. Hopefully it'll be enough to stop this bastard. Glinda, keep an eye on the King; if he looks like he's getting close to killing Dorothy, do _everything you can _to get his attention. Woolwax, Brollan- keep those Nomes busy while I cast the spell!"

"Whatever you're going to do, be quick about it!" Brollan roared. "These things just keep coming!"

Elphaba barely heard him: she was already chanting the incantation, feeling the words of the spell flowing across her lips and transmuting into magical power as she cast her will towards the distant figure of the King. This wasn't as haphazard as her earliest uses of the Grimmerie; this wasn't the desperate attempt to impress the Wizard, or her fluke levitation enchantment a moment later, or that horribly improvised attempt at saving Fiyero's life. This was the epitome of precision; every word she spoke was carefully pronounced and uttered- and it had to be.

If she'd learned anything in all the time she'd spent using the Grimmerie, it was this: the more powerful the spell was, the bigger the mistakes could be; in some cases, you'd get the spell working- just not in the way intended; in others, the results could be so random you'd be lucky to leave the room with the same number of arms and legs. In one early experiment, a badly-mangled attempt to change a wallet from rough hide to soft calfskin had turned it into a swarm of angry wasps.

So, now that she was ending the first quarter of the spell, she'd have to speak the words as carefully and concisely as-

"LOOK OUT!"

Elphaba had just enough time to think "_Oh what now?"_ before Glinda grabbed her around the middle and dived to the right just in time for the War Engine to go hurtling past; it _just_ missed Rasp, went thundering down the stairs loudly enough to alert the three close-combatants well before it reached them, and crashed to a halt on top of the first row of attacking soldiers.

For a moment, the world went silent: Elphaba couldn't hear anything over the pounding of her heart and the fading echo of the War Engine's landing. Then she heard Diggs yelling, "_Sorry..."_ and very nearly burst out laughing. Apparently, the workers had made a slight mistake in getting the machine down the stairs.

"Mistake?" she heard herself explode. "Mistake? Fath- Diggs, if that's your idea of a slight mistake, I'd hate to see a major screwup! _I just botched the spell!"_

"We're still alive, aren't we? That's got to count for something."

"True, but I only got through the first line of the spell; I mean, what did it do? _What the hell did __**I**__ just do?!"_

* * *

They were trapped: on all sides, Nomes were pouring out of the walls and lurching towards them, their bodies forming monstrous shapes as they reached out to grab them- bear-trap jaws, lashing tentacles, scorpion tails, and all manner of clawed arms. At last, Dorothy realized why many of the walls had windows facing bare rock: it was to allow Nomes easy access to the chamber, all so they could surround anyone lucky enough to win the King's game.

But she knew that they weren't here to finish them off, for above them, the Nome King's hand was slowly descending towards Jack. Before he could scurry out of the way, before anyone could reach him- or his head- the King had grabbed him in another uncanny burst of speed.

Slowly, he was lifted, upside-down and terrified, towards the King's gaping jaws. Dorothy could only watch helplessly as those same jaws opened wider than ever, ready to engulf Jack...

... Then she felt something ripple across the room- something that bore the crackling, electrical feel of magic...

... And several hundred feet in the air, a chicken clucked loudly.

Dorothy had almost forgotten that Bilina had been hiding inside Jack's head when his part of the game had started, and for a moment, her heart very nearly stopped at the thought of two of her friends being killed at once. But then she looked around, and realized that the sound of Bilina's clucking had provoked a very odd reaction in the surrounding Nomes.

Every single Nome in the room was staring up at the figure dangling from the Nome King's grasp, their faces suddenly agape with fear.

Overhead, the King hadn't shut his jaws; judging by the look of naked terror in his eye, he was too scared to jostle the chicken that was dangling above them.

From her position inside Jack's head, Bilina shouted, "I LAID MY EGG!"

As one, every single Nome in the room took a step back.

During his unceremonious hoisting into the air, the top of Jack's head- normally kept firmly shut- had fallen open; now, around the circular rim of the opening in Jack's pumpkin head, something tiny and white was beginning to circle. It was undoubtedly an egg, and it was just on the verge of falling.

Very carefully, the King moved to draw Jack away from his mouth- but not carefully enough.

Suddenly, the egg stopped its mad roll around the inside rim of Jack's skull, and fell right towards the open jaws below.

The King slammed his mouth shut- but too late, too late...

An awful silence followed.

Even from here, Dorothy could already tell that something was different about the Nome King; the stone that composed his body was slowly turning pale and ashen. But as she watched, she realized that this wasn't another one of the King's regular transformations: this time, she could see the stone turning powdery and weak before her eyes, crumbling ever-slightly under its own weight.

A moment later, every single Nome in the room was in motion, diving back into the walls and disappearing into the floors, some taking to their heels and running at full speed towards the exit in a blind terror. And all of them were shouting a single word as they departed:

"POISON!"

* * *

During the long months following her escape from Oz, Elphaba had often wondered what it would have been like if water really _could_ have melted her: how would the final deadly liquefaction have proceeded? Would it have been as short as she faked it- a brief, screaming collapse into liquid? Or would it have taken longer? Would she have staggered on through Kiamo Ko, slowly melting away with every step she took, leaving a long trail of bubbling green slime in her wake?

She'd never found any answers to those questions- partly because they were dreamed up during a time when her imagination had drifted strongly towards the morbid, but mostly because she hadn't been able to work up the nerve to experiment.

Watching the Nome King's death throes play out in the distance provided all the answers she'd never really wanted: true, it wasn't melting _per se__,_ but the decomposition swiftly eroding the King's features looked worryingly close. Before her eyes, he was slowly withering away, his stone flesh crumbling into ashes and rushing down his flanks in great clouds of dust; and though his face was already beginning to collapse under the effects of the poisons, the look of pain and shock was still written clearly on every remaining feature.

And Elphaba recognized that expression all too well; she'd seen far too many people wounded and bleeding to death in her lifetime to mistake it for anything else. It was the disbelief of someone watching their life slowly drip away before their eyes.

Very slowly, the King lowered Jack to the ground, too shell-shocked to carry out any last-minute revenge. As he released the struggling figure, he turned to the figures below him, and tried to say something, but pain- coupled with the fact that his throat was beginning to crumble away- made it all but inaudible to Elphaba.

He was barely a husk of his former self, now; from beneath the decaying veneer of his stone flesh, a skeleton of marble and nickel was slowly emerging, but that was clearly starting to erode.

Then, with his skull exposed to the world and his body still flooded with poison, he began to scream.

Elphaba looked away.

There were some fates you couldn't wish on anyone.

* * *

For the second time in her life, Dorothy found herself looking down at the withered remains of one of the feared beings in all of Oz; much like the rest of her second visit, however, the experience was vastly different: the Wicked Witch's death had been over in matter of seconds, with most of the melting made invisible by the cloak she wore, and it had been followed by so much cheering and fanfare that it took a long time for Dorothy to realize that she'd just _killed_ someone. The Nome King's death was slow, with every stage of his collapse visible to the onlookers; and unlike the witch's screaming, ranting collapse, he'd remained almost completely silent up until the last few moments.

And now that he was dead, there was no cheering, no rejoicing: there was only the sound of another part of the palace collapsing into ruin.

Dorothy took a deep breath, and realized she was trembling.

_What are we going to do now?_ She wondered. _Now that the King's dead, there's nothing to stop us from leaving the palace, but how are we supposed to reach the surface? How are we going to get back across the Deadly Desert?_

Somewhere far too close for comfort, there was an explosion, and a sizeable chunk of the roof landed ten feet away from them.

_And how are we supposed to get out before the entire palace caves in on us?_

As she pondered these questions, she happened to glance down at the massive heap of rubble that had once been the Nome King, and saw the luminous red light just visible behind the mass of rocks.

Hurrying over, she began digging through the wreckage, scarcely daring to hope that she'd actually find them; but a minute later, her fingers touched gemstones, and she drew the Ruby Slippers from the pile- only slightly worse for wear after having their former owner collapse on top them. And there was still magic here, enough to make her skin crawl at the sheer power of it...

She'd been listening when the King had told her just how powerful the Slippers were: if they _were_ magical enough to help the King take over Oz, _and_ return her to Kansas, they'd be more than enough to help them escape the collapsing palace. And perhaps that wasn't all.

Hoping that the Witch would forgive her for stealing the Slippers once again, Dorothy sat down and began hurriedly removing her shoes.

As she donned the final Slipper, she felt a jolt of energy race along her spine, and suddenly, her head was flooded with images of falling stars and rock flowing like water into new and unnatural shapes, vision after vision of all that she could possibly do with these enchanted slippers. And looking down at all the assembled possibilities with her mind's eye, Dorothy realized that, for the first time in her entire life, there was absolutely nothing that could possibly stop her now: getting them out of the palace was the _least _she could do with this power; she could remake Oz, the Nome Dominions, of any other part of the world in whatever way she pleased. She could raise mountains, turn the deserts into forest, rearrange the seasons, even fuse Oz and Kansas together and prove that she'd been sane all along. If she wanted, she could destroy the entire Nome race- erase the very memory of them from history. She could rebuild Jack as a human, so that he never had to worry about his head spoiling; she could give Tik-Tok the ability to wind up his own gears; she could even return the Gump to his original body- after all, resurrecting the dead was hardly a challenge to the magic she now wielded. Time itself was open to her with the power of the Ruby Slippers; the very forces of creation bowed to them. And as long as Dorothy wore them, nothing could stop her.

"What are you going to do?" the Scarecrow whispered.

After the influx of images, this question threw her for a moment: what _would_ she do next?

Then, with another avalanche of rubble descending towards them and all the world-ending power of the Ruby Slippers hers to command, Dorothy Gale made her choice.

"I'm going to set things right," she said quietly.

Slowly, she began to click her heels...

* * *

"Basalt, it's alright," Glinda soothed, her voice the honeyed, cajoling tone that had managed to keep her in office for another month. "I'm pretty sure the King ate the only egg in the palace."

"But there may be... _toxic residue."_

"I think you mean yolk."

Basalt's face almost twisted out of shape at the sound of the word, but he managed to answer, "This is so."

"How much yolk can there be left on a pile of rocks which likely didn't even touch the egg when it landed? Besides, you're not planning on handling any of the boulders, are you?"

"No, Miss Glinda."

"Then you'll be okay, won't you? Now come on, Elphaba's waiting; I'll hold your hand, if you like..."

Almost immediately after the Nome King had finally succumbed to the poison, Elphaba had been anxious to see what had become of Dorothy and the others; with Basalt's inborn fear of eggs holding him back, Glinda had stayed behind to encourage him on while Elphaba led the others through the next few hundred feet of ruins to the King's body. It had taken several minutes for Glinda to finally persuade the Nome to get moving, but at long last, they were in motion again, ducking through the collapsed archways and passages that had once composed the ornament collection (and by now, most of the palace).

However, by the time they caught up with the rest of the group, Dorothy was nowhere to be found; the space where she'd been standing was almost lost in a massive heap of debris that had fallen from the roof. In fact, the only thing that remained the scene that had played out in the distance a moment ago was an even larger pile of rubble- the Nome King's body.

"What happened?" Glinda asked.

"The Ruby Slippers," Elphaba growled, anger and admiration mingling in her voice. "She actually _used_ them! Sweet Oz, I really hope that child knows what she's doing."

"You're sure that's what happened? I mean, she could have just run away- or she could have been buried by the cave-in."

"No, no; I know the magic of those damn shoes when I sense it. Question is, what the hell is she going to do now?"

"More importantly," added Rasp, "What are _we_ going to do now? I mean, the Nome King's dead and there's nothing to stop us from leaving, but how are we supposed to do that? The War Engine's broken."

"We can always repair it," Diggs suggested.

"That might take too long; I think the Nomes are going to be swarming all over the place long before we get those tracks working again."

There was a moment or two of humming and hawing for thought, and then Woolwax asked, "What about Glinda's Bubble?"

Glinda blushed. "I, uh... I really don't think that's an option anymore."

"Why not?"

"Er... I kind of... crashed it a little during the attack on the Emerald City. I mean," she corrected herself hastily, "I didn't lose control of the steering or anything like that, I just... um. Alright, I ran out of ideas in my first duel with the Nome King, so I decided to use it as a weapon."

Elphaba's jaw dropped. "You _weaponized _the Bubble?"

"It was the only option I had, okay? I crashed it into his head, and the energy blast did the rest."

"You... are you telling me it _exploded?"_

"Well, yes; there was a very big explosion- not enough to kill the King, but enough to blow him to pieces. And I know it was a stupid, irresponsible idea and should have saved the bubble for when I really needed it- _whoa!"_

Elphaba had unexpectedly grabbed her by the shoulders, and drawn her into a crushing bear-hug. "You have _no _idea how proud I am of you right now," she laughed, kissing Glinda on the cheek.

And then, just as the atmosphere was approaching something resembling merriment, there was an ominous rumble from pile of debris that had once been the Nome King, and a familiar voice groaned loudly. Suddenly, every single armament within reach was pointed at the heap of rubble, ready to shoot at the first sign of aggression; however, instead of attacking, the boulders of the rubble began to tentatively form the shape of a face- one lone human eyeball emerging to occupy the fragmented eyesocket.

"**Ow,"** said the King softly.

"He's still alive?!"

"**Don't sound so... aaaargh... so concerned, Elphaba. I doubt I'm going to get much healthier than I am right now... that was a direct dose of the poison I just swallowed. I'm dying..."**

"You're taking quite a while," said Elphaba coldly.

"**That's the terrible thing about poison, isn't it? It's not swift and clean as the pulp authors would have you believe: real poison is painful, messy, and often takes a lot longer than you'd expect. And this one, the poison of the egg, doesn't merely disrupt the stability of our bodies- it destroys the very energies of our spirits."**

He laughed. **"I suppose it's fitting, in a way: I was always too slow in getting things done... perhaps its right that I die that way..."**

The eye rolled for a moment, as if lost in contemplation. **"The Slippers are gone," **he said absently. **"And somehow, everything seems... clearer... calmer."**

"I think that means you haven't got a channel of overpurified magic connected to your brain- assuming you're ready to actually believe me on that particular subject."

In spite of himself, the King laughed. **"Have you ever seen a madman question his delusions?"** he chuckled. **"The irony isn't lost on me."** He sobered for a moment, the expression amidst the boulders growing contemplative. **"I'm sure I meant for something different to happen; I didn't want things to happen that way. But somehow, I did. I wanted Oz erased, but instead... what **_**did**_** I do? And I think I got the War Council too, but that could be just a dream..."**

The eyeball turned in Elphaba's direction. **"Do you think it could have been different?"**

"What do you mean?"

"**If I'd stayed myself. I'd been able to hang on to my sanity just a little longer, maybe I could have accomplish what I'd **_**really**_** wanted to do. Do you think that's possible? And what about **_**you,**_** Basalt?" **the King added harshly. **"Do you think I might have succeeded... or do you think your treachery was justified even before I descended into madness?"**

Basalt said nothing; if he felt anything at the King's insult, he certainly didn't let his emotions show.

Instead, Glinda stepped forward. "In case you haven't noticed, you're on your deathbed, Your Majesty. Haven't you got better things to do than whine about how badly things went?"

Once again, the King chuckled weakly. **"I don't know. After all, I haven't the slightest idea how long it'll take my spirit to finally dissolve; perhaps I'll die within the next minute, perhaps I've got another day's worth of life left in this decaying husk... but we'll see how things transpire, won't we?"**

* * *

It was night-time when Dorothy and the others finally arrived back in Oz, tumbling back out of the void and onto a grassy hill overlooking the ruins of the Emerald City. For a moment, they sat in silence, checking that they'd all made the journey in one piece. Dorothy, however, could only look out at the forest below them and wonder if the Ruby Slippers had worked; as far as she could see, the landscape around her hadn't changed much: the trees still grew thick and impassable across the roads, and the city itself still lay in ruins.

Then, no sooner had she began to wonder what she'd done wrong, when a vivid green light rippled out across the broken skyline; when it finally faded, the towers and spires of the Emerald City stood tall once again. But the magic didn't stop there; it travelled onwards across the surrounding forests, rearranging the landscape and clearing the trees...

And then, just as the wilderness had begun to resemble the Oz she'd loved so much, a thought occurred to Dorothy: "Where's Tik-Tok?"

At first, it seemed the answer was fairly simple: they'd forgotten about him; when the Nome King had burst into the ornament collection and brought the game to an end, Tik-Tok had been the only transformed player left in the room. In the desperate chase through the hallways and the chaos that followed the King's death, nobody had had the time to look for him- or indeed the presence of mind to remember him. However, as Dorothy considered using the Ruby Slippers again, Bilina asked, "What's that on your antler?"

Close examination of the Gump's oversized antlers revealed that there was a tiny green medal dangling from one of the lower points... as if, in the rush to escape the ornament collection, the Scarecrow had accidently swept the Gump's head through one of the shelves and accidentally collected some of the ornaments along the way.

Jack's eyes widened. "You don't think it could actually be..."

"There's only one way to find out," said Dorothy. Gently plucking the medal from the antler, she held it tightly in her hand, and shouted, "OZ!"

And in a brilliant flash of light, Tik-Tok was standing before them. His head briefly swivelled left and right, taking in the dwindling forest around them. "My-Think-Works-Must-Have-Completely-Run-Down," he said bemusedly. "I-Do-Not-Remember-Leaving-The-Palace. But-What-Is-Happening-Now? Did-We-Win?"

Dorothy smiled. "I think so," she said, almost giddy with relief. "I think everything's going to be fine..."

But why, she wondered, did something in the pit of her stomach tell her otherwise?

* * *

Something was wrong.

Elphaba wasn't sure how she knew this, but something in the area had changed for the worst; it took a while for her to realize that this clue had emerged from the current state of her clothes. During the fight with the King, her cloak and dress had been soaked with Nome/Human hybrid blood; up until a moment ago, those same clothes had still been drenched. Now, for no reason whatsoever, they were dry.

She glanced in the direction of the King's still-moving body, and with an unpleasant jolt to the heart, found herself staring directly into the dying Nome's eye...

... An eye that was now made of _stone_.

As if in slow motion, she turned to Basalt; he'd clearly seen the King's return to normality, too, and was already turning to run. But before he could work up a decent pace, the Nome King's voice rang out:

"_**HALT."**_

Basalt stopped in mid-footfall, and stayed there, frozen in place. The others, paralysed with shock, ironically did the same.

"_**TURN."**_

Without a word of protest, Basalt obediently turned in the direction of the King.

The stone eye flickered towards Elphaba and Glinda. **"SEIZE THEM."**

Before either of them could react, Basalt's arms shot out, vice-like fingers fastening around their throats and hoisting them off the ground. Choking, Elphaba kicked out wildly at Basalt's chest, trying vainly to force him to let go; Glinda, meanwhile, was trying to speak, the words "What are you doing?" barely escaping her mouth.

"**Not so rebellious **_**now**_**, is he?"** said the King smugly. **"A bit tighter if you please, Basalt."**

As Basalt's grip slowly constricted around her throat, Elphaba heard Diggs shouting, "Let her go! LET HER GO OR I'll SHOOT!" He was holding a rocket launcher in his hands; the others were similarly armed, and all of them were aiming straight at Basalt.

"**Would you risk hitting your daughter, Pinhead? I think not."**

Diggs' aim shifted slightly to the right. "I'll shoot you much more readily, Roquat; let her go, or you die now."

"**I'm already dying, idiot; not a lot you can do to me now. And besides, do you really think you'll be able to hit me before I can order her execution?"**

"Just let her go!" the former Wizard shouted desperately. "I'll give you anything- _anything!"_

"**Not so Great and Terrible now, are we? And do stop begging: I very much doubt you've anything left to offer me. Tighter, Basalt."**

"B-Basalt," Glinda choked, "You don't have to do this; try... try to ig... ignore him!"

"I am sorry," said Basalt helplessly. "I cannot ignore his orders or resist them; please forgive me."

"You _can_ resist!" Elphaba gasped, futilely trying to prise his fingers from her throat. She tried to focus on casting a spell, but the lack of oxygen made it almost impossible to concentrate. "You're not a mindless golem, Basalt, you're... _nnngg... _you're a free Nome! You disobeyed him once, you can do it again! Just _try-_ _please!"_

Basalt's expression warped with the effort of trying to ignore a direct order. "Please forgive me," he whispered. "Please forgive me."

"You can do it!" Glinda shouted. "He's not even there, Basalt; he's dying, you don't have to listen to him anymore if you don't want to!"

"**Save your breath, Glinda,"** said the King icily. **"You're going to need it."** He chortled darkly as the enslaved Nome's grip tightened even further. **"What to do with you now, I wonder," **he mused. **"I can attribute more half of my recent failures to you two, and I'd feel more than justified in taking bloody revenge. I could easily just have your necks broken here and now; or perhaps a nice long flaying would be more appropriate. Perhaps something more extravagant- I could have Basalt shred you quite literally from limb to limb. Or best of all, I could have you taken into the deepest regions of the caverns and left there to rot..."**

He paused for effect. **"But I won't,"** he said at last. **"Basalt, release them."**

Elphaba and Glinda immediately landed in a heap on the floor; for a moment, they lay there, wheezing for breath, too disoriented to rise.

"**As you said, Glinda, I've got much better things to do than moan about the past. Now is a time for **_**survival."**_

"Oh no," said Basalt softly.

Suddenly, everyone was shouting: Glinda was yelling at Basalt to run, Basalt was yelling at Diggs to shoot him, Elphaba was yelling at Diggs to shoot the King, and Diggs and the others were trying once again to shout the King into submission. Then, before anyone could open fire, the King raised a vestigial hand and sent a shockwave hurtling towards them, knocking everyone but Basalt to the ground and taking another chunk out of the neighbouring wall.

"**I came **_**close**_** to what I wanted to accomplish,"** the King whispered. **"Now, I have the chance to complete it- with your assistance, Basalt."**

"You don't have to do this," Basalt said, and it might have just been Elphaba's imagination, but she swore she heard a hint of fear in the Nome's voice- just audible over the sound of the wall giving way.

"**Do you really think so?" **The face amidst the rubble formed a mocking smirk. **"Then perhaps it's time you truly learned the demands of leadership. Now hold still: the pain will only last for a moment..."**

A few feet away, the wall finally collapsed, sending at least fifty tonnes of rubble hurtling towards them; the last thing Elphaba saw before it reached her was the Nome King's spirit ripping itself free of the inert body it had been anchored to and surging towards Basalt in the shape of an enormous vulture, its skeletal wings spread wide and needle-sharp talons ready to fasten on the helpless victim before it. And in that second before the monstrous spirit engulfed him, she heard Basalt murmur a single word:

"Glinda-"

Then the landslide of debris struck them head-on, plunging Elphaba's world into darkness.

* * *

A/N: Yes, I am a bastard when it comes to cliffhangers. I'm sorry for doing this all over again, GoodWitchesOfOz.


	36. The Endgame

A/N: Ladies and gentleman, I present to you the latest (and probably the second-last) chapter. It's been exhausting but impossibly enjoyable to write, and I can only hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

To GoodWitchesOfOz: Thank you for your forgiveness, and I hope the chapter meets and exceeds all expectations; and I made what Dorothy did with the Ruby Slippers a touch on the ambiguous side anyway (for reasons you'll discover in this very chapter) so don't worry too much.

Inbalwolf: No, you didn't spit on me in any past lives. In fact, the most I've been able to get out of my past lives is that they all arrived late for their own funerals; the hearse was delayed, the embalmer's parlour exploded, the Viking longboat was swept away before anyone could set fire to it, the coffin was knocked overboard and used by a convinct-turned-surfer to escape from the coast guard, the serial killer kept forgetting to dump the body in a lake... Sorry, don't know what came over me there. But in any event, I'm happy to fulfil most of the requests... key word being most- I have to stop the characters from dying of stress-induced heart-attacks _somehow_. But without giving too much away, I think I ticked off most of the essential boxes on the checklist. One might have to wait until the last chapter- you'll find out which soon.

Wile E. Coyote: Yep, that was exactly the trope I was aiming for. After giving the King so many successes, I felt it was time to even up the score.

Guest: Yes, you can quote that line, just make sure you mention the source in the A/Ns for that chapter. PS: A Star Wars/Wicked crossover? Consider my curiosity officially piqued. It'll be very interesting to see where it goes...

Now, without further ado, read, review and above all, enjoy!

Disclaimer: Wicked. Not Mine. Return to Oz. Not Mine. Oz. Not mine.

* * *

In the few seconds before the King's spirit tore into him, Basalt felt time itself slow to a glacial crawl. He had no idea why: perhaps some of the Ruby Slippers' magic had escaped to contaminate the air around him, but it didn't seem likely; if anything, this was almost certainly an instinctive response to his imminent death.

After all, he knew without a shadow of doubt that he was going to die; after all, he had read the forefather's book from cover to cover, and in all the many thousands of years and hundreds of possessions that it had documented, no victim of the technique had ever survived with their personality intact. Escaping wasn't an option, either: once the process began, there was no way of escaping it unless the caster relented- and given Roquat's current state, the chances against him having a last-minute change of heart were beyond astronomical. And trying to fight off the possessing spirit was impossible, according to the book: no Nome could withstand the energies of the King's spirit or the personality-overwriting enchantments that surrounded it; an ensnared Nome could only resist for so long before being devoured.

But he had to try: even if it was pointless, even if there was no way of escaping the King's grasp, he had to resist. With Glinda and Elphaba struggling to breathe, Diggs and the others currently disarmed and a wall about to collapse on those still standing, there was nobody left to help him. Every atom of Basalt's rational mind told him that giving up was out of the question: if the King escaped death again, there'd be no stopping him; everything Elphaba had done in the last few hours would have been for nothing. And there was something else that screamed for attention deep within his being as the King's monstrous form spread its wings to envelop him, something that Basalt had often had to override in pursuit of his duties- but could no longer be ignored:

His self-preservation instincts.

Even though his body was still paralysed by the King's order, a mental alarm bell was ringing somewhere deep inside Basalt's psyche and demanding that he move- or fight back, or scream for help- anything, so long as it got him as far away from the King as possible.

He glanced down at the crumpled human shapes at his feet, still trying to recover their breath; for some reason, he felt the urge to say something to them. But what should he say? Should he call for help? Suggest that they destroy him before the King could take possession? Apologise for not being able to resist the King's orders?

"Glinda," he began. He wanted to thank her for everything she'd done for him, for trusting him with so much of her story when she'd had no reason to do so. And he wanted to thank Elphaba, too: without her guidance, he'd have never found the courage to do _any_ of this. He wanted to say so many things in that moment- things that had never occurred to him before this instant, things that he'd probably never have the chance to voice again.

Then time returned to normal, and the King struck him head-on.

Instantly, Basalt's vision was flooded with blinding light as the energies of the King's monstrous spirit enveloped him; at the same time, he heard the noise of the avalanche as it descended on the room around him, and felt the sensation of rock and debris hammering against his body. It didn't hurt him, though- it didn't even force him backwards; he was now cocooned in a thick shell of magical energy and beyond all harm.

Well, beyond all _physical _harm.

A moment later, the blinding light in his eyes was gone, replaced by a pitch-black void yawning open before him, like a colossal maw waiting to swallow Basalt's psyche whole. The Forefather's book had mentioned this in its record on the technique: this field of nothingness was the Nome King himself- now visible only to Basalt's mind- readying to absorb every last facet of his personality.

No sooner had he realized this when something cold and daggerlike stabbed into Basalt's mind, brutally tearing through his thoughts and sinking deep into his consciousness. For a moment or two, Basalt could only stand there, paralysed by shock, all thoughts of resistance temporarily forgotten in the wake of the frost that was slowly colonizing his brain; he'd experienced pain before- but only briefly, and certainly not like this.

Then he felt the cold moving deeper, and heard the King's voice whispering the arcane words of the Forefather's technique; once again conscious of the threat, he struggled to force the presence out of his mind through sheer force of will, trying to grasp at the hand that was forcing the dagger of ice into his he couldn't: it was like trying to wrestle water; every time he thought he was close to shoving the blade away, it slipped clean through his mental fingers.

But he had to keep fighting; he had to, if only to buy time. And if nothing else, he did seem to be stopping the freezing touch from reach any deeper... maybe if he delayed the King long enough, his spirit would simply die from the poison-

Fresh pain tore through him, forcing his mental grip away from the dagger's hilt and back down into the depths of his mind. Reeling back in agony as he tried to claw his way back up, Basalt realized that the King could hear his thoughts; there was no way of keeping anything a secret from the King anymore- not now that the King was slowly ripping his way into his thoughts. And worse still, just as he was trying to recover his grip he felt something new- something that very nearly tore his fingers loose and sent him plummeting into oblivion:

Fear.

The King had just given him a new emotion; it now flooded his being, unregulated by any of the normal constraints that stopped a Nome from being overwhelmed by new emotion, and suddenly, Basalt was no longer interested in keeping his grip on his consciousness. He was now ducking and cowering with every new stab of pain, trying to escape them even though the few remaining rational thoughts in his head told him it was futile.

Another emotion struck him and burrowed deep into his soul, its blazing intensity nearly melting the ice of the King's invasion: anger. Suddenly, Basalt felt rage and hatred bubbling at the pit of his stomach – at first, only towards the King for betraying his people and for singling out Basalt for this futile attempt at a resurrection; then, as the anger grew, it turned on Elphaba- _fucking green-skinned bitch! _He'd told her that this might happen; why hadn't she done anything to stop the King before it was too late? Or what about Glinda? The vacuous little quim had led him into this with her endless weeping over her dead friend- it was because of her that he was going to die! And the Wizard too, the thieving old bastard!

Then the anger refocussed again, and Basalt suddenly found himself the target of his own rage: why had he bothered to turn and run when he saw that the King wasn't human anymore? He should have just slipped back into the earth before the King had been able to speak a single word! Why hadn't he been strong enough to resist the orders? He'd nearly killed Elphaba and Glinda- all because he'd been too weak to ignore the King. He was going to die because of that same weakness, and even worse, he'd spent the last few seconds pathetically blaming everyone but himself instead of trying to focus!

Peering through the haze of agony, terror and fury that now clouded his thoughts, Basalt tried one more time to fight back- only to be engulfed by a solid _wave_ of emotions: dizzy and nauseous, he vaguely discerned sorrow and remorse among his new emotional range, followed by lust, greed, mirth, loneliness, envy, apathy, pride and far too many more to count. He was drowning in a torrent of information too complex and too numerous to properly assimilate; he barely understood half of the emotions that had just been forced on him- in part because he was experiencing _all of them at once!_ And with every new feeling that rushed through him, his resistance to the King's invasion slowly eroded as he descended closer and closer towards madness.

Somewhere in front of him, the King laughed. **"What's wrong, Basalt? Didn't you want emotions?"**

"Not this way," Basalt whispered.

The only answer was a hiss of effort, as the stabbing pain descended once more; this time, he was too weak to resist as the King's mental fingers tore his defences apart, levering his mind open like a clamshell- allowing the King to feast on the personality within.

Basalt wanted to scream his last words, to try and make one last display of defiance; but he was too exhausted by the fight and the maddening influx of emotions to raise his voice above a murmur, and besides, his mind was now awash in the last of all the emotions he'd been granted: despair.

"I'm sorry, Glinda," he said wearily. "I wasn't strong en-"

One last jolt of pain shot through Basalt, and both his last words and the mangled remains of his psyche tumbled into the waiting jaws of the abyss.

* * *

"Elphaba? _Elphaba!"_

Somewhere under a thick mantle of dust and pebbles, Elphaba very slowly opened one eye and immediately regretted it: somewhere between the collapse of the wall and blacking out, she'd obviously been pelted with a few sizeable chunks of rubble, for she was now sporting fresh bruises across her arms and back, along with an especially painful one on the side of her head. On the upside, she'd been lucky enough to avoid the worst of the avalanche; she'd only been showered with the lighter debris.

"_Where are you? _Elphaba, if you can hear me, answer me!_ PLEASE!"_

Come to think of it, what had become of everyone else? How many of them had escaped the chaos alive? And what had happened to Glinda?

She forced herself to remember, trying furiously to think past the thudding pain in her head. After a few seconds of trying to ignore both the headache and the distant sounds of screaming, Elphaba recalled that, in the last few seconds before the King had launched himself at Basalt and the wall had come crashing down on them, Glinda had been lying right next to her.

"_ELPHABA!"_ screamed the voice- which, come to think of it, wasn't all that distant at all.

Suddenly wide awake, Elphaba sat bolt upright, dislodging several pounds of ashes in the process. Forcing both dirt-clogged eyes open, she found herself sitting in the middle of a massive cloud of dust, with no sign of any of the recognizable landmarks that had once composed the half-ruined ornament collection; and though there were vague shapes stirring in the piles of rubble around her, there was no way of telling if they were human or Nome. So, once she'd finished coughing, she turned in the general direction of the voice and managed to gasp out, "Glinda? Is that you?"

By way of an answer, something in the dust cloud let out a choked sob and hugged her fiercely; it was indeed Glinda, and if she'd looked uncharacteristically bedraggled before, now she was almost unrecognizable: powdered from head to toe in dust, her brilliant blonde tresses turned grey and her dress torn to rags by the avalanche- had she been in the mood to laugh, Elphaba would have found the image utterly hilarious. As such, she could only check Glinda for injuries, frantically asking her if she was unhurt.

"I'm fine," Glinda assured her. "I just got the wind knocked out of me. But what about you?"

"Don't worry; it's only a few bruises."

"A few bruises? Elphaba, look at your _leg!"_

As it happened, the leg itself wasn't what Glinda was looking at; after all, what with the cloak Elphaba had been wearing, she wouldn't have been able to see any wounds down there if there'd been any- one of the downsides to wearing black. Instead, her gaze was fixed on the trickle of blood oozing from just beneath Elphaba's knee. As it turned out, a large chunk of filigreed ceiling had landed squarely on her left leg during the avalanche, puncturing her calf muscles in at least four places. And for good measure, it seemed as though the brickwork the filigree had once been attached to had landed heavily enough to-

"_Aaaaaargh!"_

"For Oz's sake, Elphaba, don't try and stand up!"

"I wasn't; I was just trying to see if I could move it."

"Well, can you?"

"No. I think it's safe to say that something's broken down there." She laughed. "And here I was, thinking it was just another bruise. Can you stand?"

"I didn't have any trouble a minute getting up a couple of minutes ago. Question is, where are we supposed to go, anyway?"

"Anywhere out of this mess would be nice; I just need to bandage this wound, and we'll get going..."

Thankfully, Elphaba's bag and its small cache of medical supplies hadn't been swept away or crushed in the collapse of the wall, so at least she was spared having to use her cloak for bandages (which might just guarantee a lethal infection, given that her clothes could probably stand up on their own by now). It took several minutes of screaming, struggling and swearing for the two of them to properly clean and bind the wounds, but eventually, the blood was finally staunched and Glinda was able to help Elphaba to her feet. By now, the dust cloud had cleared, allowing the two witches an unimpeded view of the carnage around them.

When the wall had collapsed, it had brought with it a huge landslide of masonry from the upper floor of the palace that ended up almost erasing the remains of the ornament collection: the entire chamber was filled almost to the ceiling with rubble, the lowest point of it being almost right in front of them. As for Basalt, Diggs, Rasp, Brollan and Woolwax, there was sign that any of them had survived the impact; the sea of wreckage before them remained entirely undisturbed, with no indications that anyone beneath it was still moving- or breathing, for that matter.

As for the King, the remains of his body were lost among the pebbles and dust.

"Do you think any of them are still alive?" Glinda asked quietly.

"I don't know: it all depends on where they were standing when the wall came down." Elphaba shook her head. "We only survived because we were back here; if they were at the front of the room-"

Before Elphaba could finish her sentence, someone to the left groaned loudly; it came from one of the few doors that hadn't been blocked by the avalanche, where something vaguely recognizable as Brollan was slowly clambering to his many feet. Wherever he'd been standing when the landslide has hit him, he'd clearly caught the brunt of the debris: most of his limbs looked twisted out of shape, and his already-distorted hide was covered with jagged wounds from bricks, ceiling fixtures and broken ornaments; the rest of the damage was almost impossible to examine under the thick arterial blood that was now oozing down Brollan's misshapen flank. In fact, the only reason why he was standing at all was because Woolwax, Rasp and Diggs were supporting the few of his arms that weren't broken, with Javelin doing his best to support the mangled Gillikin's legs.

These other three survivors looked none the worse for wear, despite having been in almost the exact same position as Brollan: true, Diggs' support frame was now broken in several places, Rasp's limp was much more pronounced than usual, and Woolwax was sporting a bloody nose, but that was the extent of their injuries.

"Christ almighty, Elphaba," Diggs gasped. "Your leg-"

"Never mind that; how did you survive?"

"You can thank Brollan here for that; he shielded us-"

"-nearly suffocated us too," Woolwax added sarcastically.

"What?"

"There's no other way to explain it, Elphaba: he just jumped on top of us before the wall collapsed. Once cave-in was over, we climbed out, and we've wandering around the cellar for the last few minutes looking for you."

Elphaba could only gape incredulously. "Sweet _Oz_," she muttered. "How the hell is he still alive? How is he even standing?"

By way of an answer, Brollan laughed weakly and slipped free of his supporters' grasp, hitting the ground with a loud, meaty _thud._ Immediately, everyone crowded around him, hastily gathering together what little medical supplies they could find as they hobbled over. It was immediately obvious that Brollan's condition was grave; on top of the various dislocations and fractures throughout his distended skeleton, he was bleeding very heavily and possibly concussed. Elphaba and Glinda did their best to stabilize him, but with their limited repertoire of healing spells and the Gillikin's mutated physiology there was only so much they could do.

"We'll just have to carry him until we can find someone who can help," said Woolwax.

"Like who?" Elphaba snapped, as she hastily sealed a gash across Brollan's shoulder. "Do you think there's anyone in a thousand miles who could treat injuries like this? Do you think anyone knows how to deal with them on someone with a body like _this?"_

"Why do we need to bother looking for someone?" said Rasp. "We've got the Grimmerie, haven't we? There's apparently a healing spell in there that-"

"You _seriously_ want to use the same spell that made Brollan like this in the first place?"

"I'm just saying- if you say the words clearly and concisely, and nothing interferes with the process, everything should be fine."

"Rasp, look at our track record: something is guaranteed to go wrong."

Glinda looked up from the pile of semi-human limbs at her feet, opening her mouth as if to say something; however, as her gaze drifted over Diggs' shoulder, she almost immediately lapsed back into silence, her eyes widening in astonishment. "Diggs," she said after a moment of voiceless shock. "While you were explorifiating the cellar, did you happen to see Basalt anywhere?"

Nobody answered; they could already guess at what was now standing behind them. For what felt like millennia, the six of them stood there, their minds collectively hijacked by an entire legion of horrifying questions: had Basalt somehow managed to survive the onslaught, or had the King absorbed his soul? Was the Nome standing behind them really Basalt, or was it Roquat? If so, was he trying to fool them, or was he just waiting for them to turn around so he could look into their eyes as he finished them off?

Elphaba was the first to break the stalemate and look up: she was ready for violence at that point; she was ready to smash rock into vapour if she had to, and she was so agitated (from both nerves and the keening pain in her left leg) she was on the verge of launching everything she had at the intruder.

The sight of the figure behind them almost immediately disarmed her.

As far as she could tell, the Nome looked completely identical to Basalt: his build was the same, the stone that comprised his body was the same, his face was the same... in fact, it wasn't until she and Glinda had hobbled closer that she realized that this last fact wasn't entirely true: Basalt's face was no longer frozen in his usual expressionless mask; his mouth was now downturned in a grimace, his brow furrowed in concentration, eyes clenched shut. The change expression didn't stop at his face, either: he wasn't standing to attention as he'd always done- he wasn't even upright; he was now sitting, half-slumped against the wall, clutching his skull as if in agony, his body periodically wracked by twitching, shivering fits.

"Basalt?" Elphaba whispered.

He didn't respond.

"Roquat?" she asked, a touch experimentally.

The Nome- either Basalt or the King in disguise- refused to answer, and indeed gave no indication that he'd even heard her. However, as Elphaba limped closer, she noticed that Basalt's lips appeared to be moving, as though he was trying to speak; whatever he was saying, it was almost inaudible, and it wasn't until she'd hastily shushed Diggs and the others that she finally heard the catatonic Nome's fevered mutterings.

"Oh no **no** no **no **no **no,"** he whimpered. "The **gaping **jaws **slammed shut and** I'm still caged behind **them..."** Even at the volume he was speaking at, the change in his voice was immediately obvious: one moment it was a perfectly ordinary Nome voice, thick with pain and fear though it may have been; the next, however, it had taken on the deep, rumbling bass of the Nome King. **"I tried, I tried, **it wasn't enough," he carried on, louder and more insistent than before. "I'm sorry, **Glinda, **I **tried, **but he didn't let me **he just tore me open and..."**

"Basalt," Glinda hissed urgently. "I'm right here- tell me what's wrong..."

Basalt's eyelids shot open, and for a second or two, Elphaba thought that the eyes beneath them were actually glowing. But then she looked closer and realized that- in much the same way that the King had a few short hours ago- Basalt was crying tears of molten lava.

"**It hurts!" **he moaned. "It hurts **it hurts **it hurts **it hurts **it hurts **it hurts **it hurts **it hurts **it _hurts... _There's too much of it, too much to take in, **it's crushing me- **I can't separate what happened then from** what's happening now**! There's too many of you here, Elphaba; **he was watching you for so long... **Gods, he **lived** for so many **thousands upon thousands of years- **why did I ever think I had a chance of stopping him alone?" He laughed hysterically, his voice briefly awash with mirth; then he began to sob again. "I'm **sorry, **Glinda, I'm so sorry **I tried I tried but I wasn't strong enough and I should have tried harder I shouldn't have hurt you and Elphaba but I was weak and stupid and-"**

Over the course of the last minute or so, Glinda had been trying to get the traumatized Nome's attention, without much success; whatever had happened to him, he was in no fit state to respond. Unfortunately, Basalt's silence- or the boiling tears coursing down his face- didn't do much to discourage her. "Basalt," she said gently (one hand drifting unconsciously towards Basalt's face), "Everything is going to be alright: whatever's happened to you, we can help- Elphaba and I are witches, don't forget. Just take a deep breath, calm down and explain what _AAAAAAAAAAARGH!"_

Glinda, not recognizing lava by sight, had made the mistake of trying to touch Basalt's face in some desperate attempt to calm him down; she hadn't actually touched one of the tears- she'd noticed the searing heat long before she'd actually made contact- but judging by the smell of burning meat in the air, that hadn't done her any favours. Elphaba didn't see what happened next: because Glinda was now clutching her injured hand in a desperate attempt to smother the burning, this had left Elphaba unsupported just long enough to send her crashing to the ground.

Seconds later, Glinda landed next to her, staring at her hand in shock and disbelief: from the fingertips to the wrist, the skin had been seared a livid purplish-red, and was now weeping blood and other less identifiable fluids. "Oh _Oz,"_ she muttered deliriously. "I... that was... pretty blonde of me, wasn't it?"

"Nevermind that," said Elphaba, trying to ignore the renewed pain in her leg. "I think I might have something for third degree burns in the bag somewhere, if I can just reach it-"

"Third?" Diggs echoed. "_Only _third degree burns? Christ, you're luckier than I was, Glinda. When the King used lava on me, he actually made sure that I didn't have any skin left on-"

There was a loud rumble of shifting rock as Basalt slowly rose to his feet; his face was still streaked with incandescent tears, but the expression on his face was no longer clouded with fear and pain. If anything, he looked light-headed, almost sleepy. Slowly, he raised his hands, and with a thrill of horror, Elphaba realized that his fingertips were swarming with magical energies; before she could retaliate, before any of the others could duck out of the way, the energy in Basalt's hands rippled outward in a wave of blinding green light.

Elphaba had just enough time to hug Glinda goodbye and regret that they hadn't been able to spend more time together before the wave struck them head-on.

But instead of erasing them from existence altogether- or burning, petrifying, electrocuting, melting, vitrifying, disintegrating or killing them in some other particularly horrific way- the wave simply passed clean through them and swept onwards to Diggs and the others. For a moment, Elphaba wondered if she'd just been exposed to something horribly toxic- if any minute now, she was going to start vomiting blood or shedding chunks of necrotized flesh.

However, as she checked herself for injuries, she noticed that the pain in her leg had inexplicably faded; a quick glance under the bandage revealed that the wound had vanished, leaving only a faint scar on her calf, as if it had been healing for weeks. The burns on Glinda's hand were fading away into old scars, too; even Brollan's gaping wounds were beginning to seal shut, his broken limbs straightening and mending as he slowly clambered to his feet.

Trembling, the two freshly-healed witches stood, Glinda turning to Basalt as if to thank him- only to find that the look of dreamlike serenity on the Nome's face was gone. If anything, he looked even more terrified than before.

"OhGods, **the spells too**," he mumbled. "So many tomes of magic **committed to memory **from the moment he was made assistant librarian and even more with every promotion... **whole libraries trapped within my skull**... it hurts..."

"What do you mean?" Elphaba asked, suspecting that she already knew the answer. "What happened to the Nome King?"

"**He's gone. Gone and dead and ashes. But not quite. Not in here." **He tapped the side of his head, a pained smile arcing wildly across his face. "He... he couldn't... he was **too weak to finish the **process; he faded away before he could **consume me altogether."**

"Then what's the problem?" Glinda asked. "If he's dead, then-"

Basalt laughed. "He's still here, Glinda!" he cackled mirthlessly. **"He's dead **but still in here. **He tore me open and poured **himself into my brain- he mightn't have been able to replace my consciousness** but he filled my mind with his emotions, his memories! **Everything he saw and felt is in here- every book, every conversation, every battle, every murder, _**EVERYTHING!**_ Oh gods, there's not enough room for all of them and they're crushing me, Glinda... and it feels as though... **as though I'm still experiencing those moments; I'm reading those spellbooks, I'm speaking the words, I'm watching Elphaba at Kiamo Ko, I'm casting a spell, **_**I'm tearing people apart with my bare hands and it's all happening at once!"**_

Glinda looked from the shivering figure in front of her to Elphaba. "Is there anything we can do to help him?" she asked.

"Your guess is as good as mine," said Elphaba grimly; from the moment Basalt had started describing the symptoms, she'd known that this wasn't going to end happily. True, it was certainly better than having the King devour Basalt's soul, but having the King's entire memory forced upon him wasn't much better considering the number of spells that could be used to alleviate the crushing pressure on Basalt's psyche (ie: zero).

"You mean there's nothing?" Glinda whispered.

"I'm didn't say that; I'm just saying that if there's any spells that can to take the strain off Basalt's mind, I don't know any of them."

"But we can't just leave him like this- not after what he did to help us! There's got to be something we can do; maybe we can erase the memories or drain them into a bottle or something..."

Elphaba thought for a moment. "From what he told me about the palace, there's library somewhere on the upper floors. Maybe there's something up there that can help us; if this has happened before, the Nomes would have probably documented it."

"Why bother with that?" said Rasp. "If the King really did memorize that many spellbooks, then maybe there's a solution in Basalt's mind and he just hasn't found it yet."

"Not to sound callous or anything," Diggs began, "But whatever we do, we're going to have to find a way out of here sooner or later, and I don't see too many exits. More to the point, what's going to happen to Basalt if we can't find a solution?" He thought for a moment, and then rephrased the statement: "What's going to happen to Basalt?"

"We shall be the judge of that," said a quiet voice.

As they turned to face the source of the voice, the ground shifted, and suddenly the already-battered walls of the ornament collection began to dissolve into air, taking the heaps of rubble with them. In a matter of seconds, the cellar and all its innumerable broken contents were gone, and the seven of them were standing on bare rock and gazing into the cathedral-like interior of the vast cavern that surrounded the palace.

Gazing back at them from every single wall and every single outcropping were Nomes- _hundreds of thousands _of them.

_If not __millions,_ Elphaba thought numbly.

More were pouring into the cavern by the second, filling up every single available space as they hastened to surround them; to Elphaba's eyes, it looked vaguely reminiscent of a crowd hurrying to find their seats at a theatre. Oddly enough, though most of them were unarmed; most of them didn't appear to be soldiers or even guards. True, the few hundred thousand Nomes that were now emerging from the ground closest to them were undoubtedly soldiers if the weaponry and armour-plating was any evidence, but the rest looked to be civilians. Judging by the fripperies on some of them, there were even a a few nobles among the crowd. Was the arrest of seven fugitives really such a spectator sport in Nome society?

"Holy shit," Woolwax muttered. "How many do you think are out there?"

"God only knows," said Diggs. "I'd say they've called in the entire army- and the guards, too."

"**All **of **them."**

"... what?"

Basalt's eyes very slowly slid shut as he tried to focus on his answer. "**It's an automatic response** one of Roquat's successors established five years ago- _five?_ **That was ten thousand years ago**... no, what am I talking about? It's still being written!"

"Basalt," said Glinda soothingly, "Please- try and concentrate for just a moment: why are all these Nomes."

"When the Nome King dies, **all Nomes are alerted within the hour **so that they can journey to the King's deathbed and **pay their respects. **It's strange, though; it's unlike soldiers to abandon their posts in wartime." He blinked. **"What?** No, the war ended two centuries past. Sorry- it's getting really difficult to think... **er, **as we are not presently under threat of invasion or war, **the army and guards have automated the border defences and returned here to mourn."**

"And they probably think we killed the King," finished Elphaba.

Rasp put his head in his hands. "We're fucked, aren't we?" he sighed.

"Hang on!" Glinda whispered excitedly. She turned to Basalt, a look of enlightenment suddenly dawning on her face. "You're technically the King's successor, aren't you? I mean, you told me the last time he tried the body-snatching thing on someone, he used it to pretend he was his own successor-"

"**But I'm clearly not-"**

"Did the King actually _have _any successors?" Elphaba asked.

"Not anymore; **the last one died fifteen years ago**-"

"Then just pretend," hissed Glinda. "If you've got his memories, then you can play the part easily, can't you?" There was a pause, as Glinda put a hand on Basalt's shoulder (clearly doing her best to ignore the fact that her entire hand barely covered a quarter of the Nome's rocky shoulder-blades). "You can do this, Basalt; _you can do this."_

Basalt's face underwent a very brief spasm of undisguised terror, his stone skin rippling wildly as he tried to control his newfound emotions. **"I... I **don't know, Glinda, I-I-I'm still _seeing _things, and I can barely concentrate and and and... **what if they suspect something**-"

"_You can do this,"_ Glinda insisted. "For the last few days, you've been playing the subterfuge game so well that even the King didn't suspect a thing: if anyone can pull this off, it's you."

For a moment, it looked as though Basalt was about to argue. Then, he took a deep breath that he probably didn't really need, wiped a few stray droplets of lava from his face, steadied his expression as best he could, and then stepped out towards the waiting multitude of Nomes.

"**My fellow Nomes,"** he proclaimed solemnly, his voice echoing majestically across the cavern. **"His Majesty the King has-"**

"Died," a voice interrupted. "Under circumstances which your allies in the palace helped to engineer. I am well aware of the situation, Basalt- including your current mental state: I have had the spies listening for the past twenty minutes, and I am more than apprised of what happened- including the use of the Technique upon you."

Basalt's entire body sagged in despair. "**You** _know?"_ he asked quietly.

"As Lord Chamberlain, I am required to know." And at last, the speaker stepped forward from the crowd. He was clearly a nobleman, judging by the silver decorations about his shoulders and the iron skullcap atop his head; he was also considerably taller than Basalt- who had to crane his neck in order to make eye contact- and made entirely of black marble. And, as he drew closer, Elphaba realized he was wearing that same grim, businesslike expression most commonly worn by executioners.

He turned to the squad of guards that had emerged from the crowd alongside him, and nodded; immediately, the guards surrounded Basalt on all sides, the first six of them training their weapons upon him while the other three went about restraining him with an impressive set of enchanted manacles.

"What are you doing?" Glinda yelled. "He was trying to help stop the King from-"

"I am well aware of the subterfuge that has been perpetrated on our society: the manipulations of the War Council, the King's own private schemes- which I only discovered thanks to Basalt's delving into the King's personal effects- and commendations are due to him of course. For the last fifteen years, we have had to endure countless deprivations at the hands of a small group of corrupt generals, along with the more apocalyptic designs of the King; now both he and the War Council are dead. I speak for all Nomes when I thank you and Elphaba for ending the King's reign of terror, but I do not wish to see his insanity continue- even if it is only through a proxy." He eyed Basalt meaningfully.

"But he's not a proxy! The King wasn't able to -"

"No? Then he hasn't been imbued with the King's memories?"

"Well, he has but-"

"And he hasn't demonstrated any signs of mental instability?"

Glinda desperately turned in the direction of Basalt, who was muttering helplessly to himself and clearly on the verge of tears.

"I'm sorry," said the Chamberlain, "But there are simply too many variables in this situation to simply let this Protector go free: armed the King's memories and - by extension- his motivations, he may very try to take the same path as the King-"

"**But I **won't!" Basalt protested. "**I was trying to stop **the King! Why would I **try to continue his work?"**

"Do you feel you can trust your own mind, Basalt? You don't feel overwhelmed by memories that don't belong to you?"

For the second time in as many minutes, the Nome protector's body sagged; Elphaba didn't have to see the look on his face to realize that he had no answer for the Chamberlain's interrogation- he was trapped, and he knew it.

"But what are you going to do to him?" Glinda asked softly.

"That has yet to be decided; incarceration would be the most logical option. Nonetheless, as Chamberlain, I am more than capable of resolving internal matters-"

Elphaba- who'd been listening to the political pomposity accumulating in the air over the last minute and getting angrier with every word- finally lost her temper. "Oh _really?"_ she exploded. "Like you "resolved" the War Council? Or way you "resolved" the Ruby Slippers fiasco? You're doing a wonderful job! I can't imagine what political crisis was keeping you occupied when the King was having my father _tortured_ in the dungeons of the palace- and don't say you didn't know he was here; you would have seen him arrive. Did you say anything to stop the King or the War Council when they waged war on Oz? Did you even get this job on your own merits, or did you just play toady to the Council until they gave you the position to shut you up?"

"Is there some point to this?" hissed the Chamberlain, brow furrowed in anger; she'd clearly hit a nerve.

"I'm just saying- if you want to prove that you're capable of handling things once the dust's finally cleared, I wouldn't start by pretending that you hadn't stood by and done nothing through the worst of the crisis... _or,"_ Elphaba added sharply, "By pretending you know what's right for everyone- by locking up a sick man!"

"Nome, actually," Diggs corrected, but he was almost drowned out by the storm of applause from the crowd: several of the Nomes were clapping- not all of them, but certainly enough to surprise the Chamberlain.

"The decision will not be mine alone," he admitted grudgingly, once the applause had faded. "But it will not be yours: we have endured human interference in our culture before, and it nearly cost us everything." He glared at Diggs, his black marble eyes briefly glittering with anger. "We shall handle our own affairs from here on; again, you have our thanks for ridding our society of damaging influences, but that does not entitle you to decide our future course. Good day."

He turned and marched away. A moment later, the guards finished manacling Basalt, and began escorting him through the crow; Basalt had just enough time to whisper, **"I'm sorry,** Glinda; I tried, but-" before the grip on his lead tightened and he was dragged away,.

Elphaba or Glinda tried to follow him, but the front franks of the army quickly moved to block the path. Elphaba briefly considered blasting her way through the crowd, but the thought died almost as soon as she considered it: she was outnumbered, and flying off the handle would likely Glinda and the others killed- along with Basalt and maybe even Nome civilians too. So, her options exhausted, she could only watch as the Protector was led into the depths of the audience, his head lolling back and forth from gods only knew what delusions were besetting him.

Then, from the ranks of the soldiers in front of them, a duo of Nome magicians emerged, immediately recognizable by the talisman-draped spellbooks they were carrying. After studying the rag-tag group before them and consulting their books for a moment or two, they began tracing the gestures of what could only be a teleportation spell about the seven of them. "This will send you back to Oz," one of them explained. "For the moment, this is all we can offer as reward for your aid."

"Could you be specific? I mean, where in Oz are you sending us?" Rasp asked.

"The Emerald City was judged to be the safest location," the magician replied curtly, and refused to answer any further questions- or suggestions, for that matter.

As the spell began to pick up energy, it belatedly occurred to Elphaba that, against all reasonable expectations, they had managed to achieve some kind of victory: the Nome King was dead his armies were out of Oz for the moment, Glinda was alive and – surprisingly – didn't hate her, and their team hadn't suffered any further casualties. It certainly didn't feel like a victory though: quite apart from the fact that they'd just lost Basalt and none of them had any idea of they were going to do next, after the last few hours of wild magic, battles, strenuous injuries, unconsciousness and angry shouting, the only thing Elphaba could feel at that moment was exhaustion.

Swaying on her feet, she found herself glancing around at the people around her, trying to get some idea of how the others felt: Glinda looked almost as weary as she felt, and a great deal guiltier; Woolwax wore an expression that suggested dogged optimism (or possibly a concussion); Rasp was eying the magicians nervously, as if he suspected foul play; Javelin looked amazed to be alive after the events of the last few hours- not to mention bizarrely discoloured thanks to the mixture of red paint and brick dust that now coated his hide; Brollan's expression was as unreadable as always. And as for Diggs, he was-

Elphaba tapped him on the shoulder. "What exactly are you grinning about?" she asked pointedly.

"You called me 'Father'," said Diggs, still smiling beatifically.

And then the teleportation spell activated and sent them tumbling into the ether.

* * *

Moments later, Elphaba opened her eyes to find herself standing in the middle of a vast marble hall, lined with intricately-sculpted columns and enormous mullioned glass windows. She briefly entertained the idea that this might be some kind of temple, until she looked closer and realized most places of worship she'd seen weren't this extravagantly decorated; they didn't sport diamond chandeliers, brocaded drapes, rolls of vivid red carpet dividing the room in two, or gold-plated double doors. And the velvet-cushioned chairs and mahogany desks that Glinda and the others were now leaning against looked out of place in this sanctified atmosphere. No, if anything, this was some kind of audience chamber.

Where had the teleportation spell deposited them? The Nomes had told them that they were going to send them back to the Emerald City, but this hall didn't look as though it belonged to any building there: along with the unfamiliar decorations and furnishings, the place was completely intact. Most of the buildings of the City had been destroyed or looted; unless this was actually some kind of underground sanctuary hidden from the Nomes and the Wheelers- which didn't seem terribly likely, given that she could see through the windows- this place couldn't possibly exist in the Emerald City.

"Where are we?" she asked blearily.

And quite unexpectedly, Glinda laughed. "You don't know? You don't recognize this place?"

"Should I?"

Diggs was chuckling too. "It looks different with the drapes open," he admitted. "But you really can't miss the..." He shook with laughed for a moment. "Just turn around," he said at last. "You'll know what I'm talking about when you see it."

Sighing deeply, Elphaba turned and found herself almost nose to nose with a familiar face squatting against the wall behind her- a gigantic mechanical head sculpted from brass and steel, coated with almost as much dust as Elphaba herself. At last she understood: she was standing in what had once been the audience chamber of the Wizard's palace; this was where she'd first defied the Wizard all those long years ago...

"But how is this hall intact?" she asked suddenly. "When I was last here, the Nomes had just about ripped the palace apart and left only one of the towers standing. I mean, this place shouldn't even exist anymore."

"Something tells me there's going to a lot of "shouldn'ts" in the next couple of sentences," said Rasp, smiling mysteriously. He'd been gazing out the window for the last few minutes, and what he'd seen had clearly had some effect on his disposition. "For a start, assuming my watch is right, it shouldn't be nighttime- it should be early afternoon. Secondly, there shouldn't be fireworks in the sky right now." There was a distant explosion, and a series of green, red and blue lights shone through the windows. "And thirdly, the city shouldn't be intact, and it shouldn't be full of people. _But it is."_

As if hypnotized, the seven of them slowly turned in the direction of the windows: outside, the Emerald City was no longer a blasted ruin of petrified citizens and crumbling masonry; instead, the towers and spires stood tall once again, each gigantic building now shining through the night with over a hundred thousand lit windows. Even the emeralds that the vengeful Nomes had torn from the walls of the buildings were now back in place.

The streets below had been cleared: the rubble had been meticulously swept away, and the corpses of those killed or petrified in the initial attack were gone as well; and now the boulevards and avenues of the restored Emerald City were thronged with people, all of them celebrating just as they had after Elphaba had faked her death.

"How is this possible?" Glinda whispered amazedly.

Elphaba could only laugh. "Dorothy you magnificent _bitch,"_ she said at last. "Oh well, at least we know what she was doing with the Ruby Slippers."

"Speaking of which," said Diggs, "Where is she?"

Before anyone could begin to speculate in this direction, there was a loud creak from the opposite end of the room as one of the enormous double doors slowly opened: judging by the neatly-trimmed green uniform, the man now standing in the doorway was a servant of some kind- probably one of the few who hadn't left the palace to attend the festivities outside. "I heard voices," he announced carefully. "I'm sorry, ladies and gentlemen, but this is a restricted-

His eyes abruptly focussed on the closest of the group- which, thankfully enough- was Glinda; true, she looked decidedly bedraggled after all almost a week of barely-interrupted work and she was covered with dust, blood and other things best left unexplored, but there was no mistaking that face. "Lady Glinda!" he exclaimed. "Most of the palace staff have been looking for you since the city was restored- are you alright? You seem..."

The servant trailed off: he'd noticed the figures standing behind Glinda. His gaze quickly swept across the group: he barely noticed Rasp, Woolwax and Javelin; thanks to the scars and disfigurations, he didn't recognize Diggs; and while his eyes bulged in horror at the sight of Brollan, it was clear that the lion's share of his attention belonged to Elphaba.

For twelve whole seconds, he stood in complete silence, jaw flapping aimlessly as he tried to find a suitable response; then, he let out a piercing scream of terror and flung himself back through the doors, shouting at the top of his voice, "SHE'S BACK! _SHE'S BACK!_ THE WICKED WITCH OF THE WEST IS BACK FROM THE DEAD! NOBODY IS SAFE! WE'RE DOOMED! _DOOMED!"_

As the servant's howls of terror faded into the distance, Elphaba very slowly hid her face in her hands. "So much for secrecy..."

* * *

For the second time in her life, Dorothy found herself returning to an Emerald City in the throes of a fully-fledged victory celebration; the guards had opened the city gates for her almost as soon as they'd seen her trudging up the path, and now, scant minutes after they'd stepped through the open portcullis, the six of them were hurtling along the crowded streets, forced along by the rising tide of celebrating citizens.

Much like the last time the city had been swept up in celebration, most of these people felt the need to congratulate Dorothy every other second of the journey towards the palace. However, what she found alarming was that none of them knew what had happened after the Nomes had attacked the city, how they'd suddenly sprung back to life, or what had been happening in the meantime; the moment they'd heard that Dorothy had returned, they'd just assumed that it had been her doing and started heaping praise on her.

She wanted to tell them that they were wrong, that if anyone was responsible for the victory, it was Bilina- and the Witch, too, for giving Dorothy the clues to make it through the Nome King's game; she even wanted to tell them that the Nome invasion had been her own fault for letting the Ruby Slippers fall into the King's hands in the first place. And there were other things she wanted to explain, things she'd glimpsed in the journey back from the Nome King's mountain, things that could only mean that Oz might not be completely healed. But she couldn't: something about the faintly desperate smiles around her silenced her before she could voice those doubting thoughts.

Then, just as she was starting to feel sad, there was a loud clanking from her left, and she turned to see the Tin Man hurrying towards her, closely followed by the Lion. Heart leaping and her doubts temporarily forgotten, she hugged them both, too glad to see her friends alive again to think on her misgivings. Once the hugs and the greetings were over with, the two of them helped Dorothy and the others from of the depths of the crowd and into a side-street where they could catch their breath for a moment.

"Sorry we're late," the Tin Man panted. "I was too busy trying to figure out what happened while I was petrified. Speaking of which, how did you get the Nomes to leave Oz and put everything back the way it was?"

Dorothy sighed. "It's a very long story," she said wearily.

"A very, _very_ long and complicated story," the Scarecrow agreed. "Speaking of which, what was it like being petrified?"

The Tin Man frowned gloomily. "Worse than rust," he shuddered. "At least I could fall asleep when I was too rusted to move; when Mombi petrified me, she botched the spell so badly that even though I was a statue, I was still aware of everything going on around me."

"Really?" Dorothy gasped. "So you _saw_ me when I finally got here yesterday?" _And you weren't able to tell me that you were still awake,_ she thought with a fresh thrill of horror.

"No, no... after the first day or so, I..." the Tin Man's brow furrowed with the effort of remembering. "I think... well, I remember someone finding me and sending me to sleep. For the last few days, I've been as fast asleep as everyone else who was petrified in the attack."

"But who helped you?"

"I don't know; I'm pretty sure I must have been imagining things by that point, because she looked like-"

Not too far away, someone screamed.

A moment later, a small cluster of green-uniformed men and women (most of them instantly recognizable as palace guards and servants) emerged from one of the nearby alleyways, wearing near-identical expressions of fear and terror; upon seeing Dorothy, they immediately thundered to a stop and hurried towards her. It took a moment for them to calm down enough to explain themselves, but eventually, one of them- a harried-looking man in a valet uniform- managed to choke out the words, "She's back; the Wicked Witch of the West is _back."_

Over the exclamations of shock or disbelief from the others, the Scarecrow asked, "What do you mean? Where did you see her?" As he spoke, Dorothy couldn't help but wonder if the Scarecrow didn't accept this information a bit too readily; Dorothy hadn't told him about how she'd met the Witch back in the Nome King's palace, so why had he taken the servant's testimony so unquestioningly? More to the point, he didn't seem terribly worried at learning that the Witch was back, either; unless he'd somehow managed to overhear the secret meeting back at the palace, he should consider her just as dangerous as she had been a year ago.

"She's in the palace," the servant gasped breathlessly. "She's holding Glinda the Good hostage in the Wizard's old audience chamber." His gaze swept back and forth across Dorothy and the others, as if only just noticing the Tik-Tok and Jack for the first time. "Dorothy, please, you... you need to stop her somehow... before she kills someone... we've got buckets of water ready, but nobody's willing to get too close- they're too scared of her magic..."

He lapsed into an exhausted silence.

Dorothy looked from the wheezing servant to the Scarecrow, who was now contemplatively stroking his chin. "How far are we from the palace?" he asked thoughtfully.

"About half an hour away," said the Tin Man.

"In that case, let's get moving; we've got a hostage situation to negotiate!"

"_Negotiate?"_ the servant yowled in disbelief. "With the _Wicked Witch of the West?!"_

But the Scarecrow wasn't listening: he was already sprinting towards the nearest coach.

* * *

Just outside the audience chamber, the deathly silence that had been gathering for the past few minutes was suddenly split by a low, spine-tingling creak as one of the great double-doors slowly rumbled open.

"Hello?" Glinda called. "You don't need to be afraid; everything's okay in here! I'm not being held hostage, and the Witch isn't going to hurt anybody." She thought for a moment. "Or kill anybody for that matter. Or destroy the city. Or take over Oz..."

"I don't think they're listening," said Elphaba quietly. "And even if they are, they probably think I forced you to say that last sentence."

At this, Glinda all but slammed the door shut. "Well, if they're actually brave enough to send guards in here, they'll find themselves proved wrong, won't they?"

"Yes- and then they'll decide that I've bewitched you or something. And if you keep it up, they'll accuse you of being a traitor and have you imprisoned and executed along with me. I think it's time we figured out some kind of escape plan..."

* * *

Less than ten minutes later, the coach skidded to a halt in front of the palace, having broken almost every single traffic law in the city (and possibly the sound barrier) in order to reach it ahead of schedule. The wheels were on fire, the reins had snapped, the coach's roof had been torn off, the driver had fainted from nervous anxiety, and both horses were now sporting heavy nosebleeds- but at least Dorothy and the others had managed to arrive in one piece. As a team of firefighters went about dousing the wrecked coach and resuscitating the driver, Dorothy, the Scarecrow, the Tin Man, the Lion and Tik-Tok clustered together on the steps of the palace to debate strategy.

"How are we even supposed to approach this?" the Lion asked. "I mean, how are we supposed to get into the audience chamber without the Witch noticing us? There's only one door."

"I-Have-Been-Informed-By-The-Guards-That-They-Are-Examining-The-Palace-Blueprints," said Tik-Tok. "It-Is-Rumoured-That-There-Are-Several-Secret-Entrances-And-Exits-Throughout-The-Building, With-The-Audience-Chamber-Being-No-Exception. This-Way-Guards-Can-Enter-The-Room-And-Disarm-The-Witch-Without-Being-Detected."

"But that'll take too long," the Tin Man insisted. "We've got to find a way of getting in there _now,_ before someone gets hurt."

"We could always try negotiation."

All eyes turned in the direction of the Scarecrow.

"As a distraction," he said hastily. "To keep her occupied until the guards can find their way inside. But you never know, negotiation might actually work..."

"Are you _sure_ you're alright?" the Tin Man asked sceptically.

"I'm fine. Look, if it worries you so much, _I'll_ handle the negotiations." Over the incredulous yells of the others, he added, "Look, it makes perfect sense when you think about it: the Witch probably still has a grudge against Dorothy; if she sees Tik-Tok, the Lion or the Tin Man approaching, she'll think she's under attack and do something rash; I'm the only person here who doesn't pose any obvious threat and hasn't been singled out by the Witch before today- making me only logical choice."

There was a long pause, as Dorothy considered volunteering herself for the negotiations- after telling the others about the meeting she'd had with the Witch back at the palace, of course. In the end, she decided against it- partly because she doubted anyone would believe her, but mostly because it would have taken too long.

Eventually, Tik-Tok admitted, "His-Highness-Does-Have-Some-Semblance-Of-A-Point."

The Tin Man didn't look convinced. "And if the Witch tries to incinerate you again?" he demanded.

"Well, I'm a lot quicker on my feet than I used to be. Besides, someone needs to head in there and negotiate before the guards get trigger-happy; even if they manage to catch the witch off guard, they might just end up hitting Glinda too. Do you want that to happen, Tin Man?"

The Tin Man's shoulders slumped. "Fine," he snarled. "Go- but if you get out of there alive, you and me are going to have a long chat about how much you actually know and why. Clear?"

"Crystal. Don't wait up for me!"

And with that, he was off and running, dashing up the steps and through the gates of the palace.

Meanwhile, the Tin Man was massaging his temples with a sound like a wire brush being scraped along his metal skin. "I'll give him five minutes," he grumbled, "and then I'm heading in after him."

"That makes two of us," said Dorothy quietly.

* * *

Several minutes on, and nobody had managed to make any progress.

Elphaba, Glinda and Diggs had been arguing strategy, trying desperately to figure out some way of escaping the palace without anyone getting hurt or killed: Diggs thought that Elphaba should blast a window open and fly off into the night before guards were posted at the walls; Elphaba- who knew that the windows were too close to the ground to avoid getting shot- wanted to find a decent hiding place in the palace until the guards could be convinced that they'd been hallucinating; Glinda didn't think there were any, and thought that the only option was to leave by broomstick from the topmost tower of the palace, where there'd be no chance of being shot down. And in the meantime, Rasp and the others had questions of their own: what would the guards make of Brollan, for example? Would they really hold their fire on his account? And what about Javelin- would he fare any better with Elphaba's reputation of gaining the sympathies of "rebel Animals?"

Just as they were on the verge of giving up, the doors abruptly swung open: there, standing under the gleaming light of the chandeliers, was Fiyero.

In that moment, Elphaba forgot anyone else was present in the room; joyfully flinging caution to the wind, she covered the space between her and the doors in an instant and flung her arms around Fiyero, kissing him passionately. For the next minute, they simply stood there, lost in the depths of what had to be the longest kiss of their entire lives. Elphaba didn't care that the audience chamber would soon be attacked by guards, or that they might kill her; after having almost lost Fiyero to the Nome King's ritual, she wasn't willing to let him go again anytime soon.

Eventually, they separated- and reality immediately surged back into place as the two of them suddenly realized that Glinda was staring at them.

"Ah," said Fiyero quietly.

"I'm sorry," said Glinda flatly, "but is there something I should know about you two? I mean, the last time I looked, you two were enemies- I think you actually ended up setting him on fire at one point, Elphaba. So please, what the hell have I missed?"

It took a while for Elphaba to respond: the moment reality had gone flooding back into the world, the guilt over hiding the truth from Glinda had returned with it, and now the tightness of her throat made it almost impossible to speak; besides, what could she possibly say to explain this? Even her desperate confession back in the dreamworld seemed easier by comparison. Eventually, though her capacity for speech finally returned: unfortunately, it wasn't in the soothing, reassuring tones she'd wanted to convey; all she could manage was a halting, guilt-muddied whimper.

"Glinda," she began, instantly hating herself for not being able to raise her voice above a mumble, "Do you remember how I promised to explain everything to you once we were out of Nome territory? Well, I'm going to start now. I know you're going to hate me for keeping this secret- you'd be more than justified in hating me for everything I've done. Do you..." She stopped; she couldn't work out what to say next.

And in that moment, Fiyero stepped in; his face was creased with the same guilt that Elphaba felt in that moment, but when he spoke, his voice was as steady and solemn as a funeral procession- as if he'd been rehearsing this moment ever since he'd become a scarecrow. "Glinda," he said, "It's me: I'm Fiyero."

Glinda blinked. "... You can't be serious," she said quietly.

"But I am: I'm the same Fiyero you met at University; the same Fiyero you fell in love with- the same Fiyero you thought was killed in Munchkinland over a year ago." He sighed, and explained himself: he told her of everything that had happened to him from the moment that he'd been dragged off into the cornfield by his former guardsmen- his transformation, the befriending of Dorothy Gale, his many failed attempts at getting Elphaba to recognize him, the voyage into the west of Oz, and how- in the same letter that revealed the truth to Elphaba- he'd helped fake her death. He even told her about the life he and Elphaba had made for themselves beyond Oz, and described his ordeal at the hands of the Nome King as he'd waited to be rescued; he kept no secrets, left no detail unexplained- every single aspect of the double-life he'd been living over the last year was brought into the light and dissected for Glinda's benefit.

At long last, he fell silent. By now, the look of shell-shock on Glinda's face was beginning to fade into an expression that looked not entirely unlike anger. "So," she said, "_That's_ what that letter was about."

"Yes."

"And that's how you knew my original name- and how you knew that I'd been keeping the Flying Monkeys."

"Yes."

Deathly silent, Glinda walked over to Fiyero; for a moment, she studied his face under the light, as if comparing his burlap features to those he'd possessed before his transformation.

Then, without saying a word, she drew back her fist and punched him in the head.

"Okay," said Fiyero, once he'd clambered upright again. "I definitely deserved that-"

"Why didn't you tell me?" Glinda shouted, slapping Fiyero across the face. "Damn it, why did you have to keep everything a secret from me- from Elphaba too up until the last minute!"

Now it was Elphaba's turn to feel utterly bewildered. "Glinda, just calm down for a minute," she soothed. "Why are you angry with him and not me? I kept the same secrets he did-"

"You didn't plan it out! When you got that letter, you didn't have a choice: it was either follow the plan or die fighting the witch-hunters." Once again Glinda rounded on Fiyero. "You could have sought me out when Dorothy first visited the Emerald City, and we could have helped Elphaba together- why the hell did you have to do it alone? Why did you have to keep everything secret, even from her? She thought she'd killed you by mistake- _you broke her heart!_"

Ducking under the next swing of Glinda's fist, Fiyero held up his hands in the best placating gesture he could manage. "I'm so sorry- but I tried," he said contritely, "I really did try to get word to her before it was too late, but every time I set out to make contact, it all went wrong: she didn't even believe I was still alive, remember? And I didn't want to hurt you more than I already had; I mean, I saw just how upset you were when me and Elphaba ran off together-"

"You idiot!" Glinda snapped- but her voice had softened considerably. "I _was_ hurt, but I'd learned my lesson: I'd gotten Nessa _killed_ just because I was jealous and wanted to get even with you and Elphaba! I wasn't going to let anything like that happen again! I mean, if you'd just looked for me in the Emerald City and told me the truth, I'd have..."

She trailed off, breathing heavily for a moment; then, without warning, she hugged Fiyero. "You bastard!" she cried.

"You're mixing the signals just a tad, Glinda," Fiyero remarked bemusedly.

"Just shut up and let me hug you."

Elphaba shook her head, not bothering to hide her smile. "I've been a terrible influence on you, haven't I?"

"You too," Glinda shot back, grabbing Elphaba by the shoulder and drawing her into the embrace. "I don't care anymore," she said tearfully, "I don't care what either of you did- I'm just so glad you're alive..."

The hug that followed seemed to last for centuries, even though it logically could have only lasted a minute at the most; it ended quite abruptly at the sound of the doors loudly creaking open, and a familiar voice mumbling, "Wha?"

For a second or two, they held the embrace; then, in perfect unison, the three of them parted, turning in the direction of the doors. In the last few minutes, it seemed that almost every ally Dorothy had been able to gather during her journey through Oz had made it into the palace, and all of them were now standing in the doorway: Boq, the Lion, Tik-Tok, Jack Pumpkinhead, Bilina, the Gump (his head, in any case)- all of them had lined up behind Dorothy, some of them ready to attack, others still too shocked by the sight they'd just witnessed.

Dorothy was clearly one of the latter: thanks to their meeting before the ritual, she wasn't surprised to see Elphaba alive, but the sight of her hugging both Glinda _and_ the Scarecrow had taken her completely off-guard; she now stood perfectly still, her face frozen in a wide-eyed open-mouthed mask of incredulity- in fact, she actually looked about three seconds away from fainting, but then again, Dorothy had proved she was tougher than that in the last few days.

Tik-Tok and the Lion were clearly readying to fight- one brandishing an iron mace in his articulated fist, and the other tensed as if to pounce; but while Tik-Tok's oxidised copper faceplate betrayed no emotion, the Lion's face was caught in a morass of different emotions- fear, hatred, suspicion (likely towards Fiyero) and utter confusion. Jack Pumpkinhead, meanwhile, knowing he'd have nothing to contribute to any battle that might ensue, had moved to the back of the group.

As for Boq, to Elphaba's surprise, she saw none of the hatred she'd learned to expect from him a year ago: his face remained inscrutably blank, his eyes scanning the room without a hint of emotion. And even though he was brandishing his axe in one hand, it seemed more as a precaution than anything else.

The shocked tableau held for about twelve seconds, with nobody entirely sure what they were going to do or say next.

Then, to the immediate right of the giant face, a hidden panel in the wall slid open: Elphaba didn't have time to see the passage beyond it- all she could see from the moment the door opened was a steady stream of guards pouring into the room, shouting warcries and death threats at the top of their voices as they moved into formation. By the time the passageway had finished disgorging troops, she counted at least forty guards crammed into the back of the hall, all of them armed with a long-barrelled Gilikin-made rifle- not extraordinarily accurate, but with that many gunman firing at once, they wouldn't need to be.

As one, they aimed at Elphaba. They showed no signs that they'd noticed anyone else in the room apart from Glinda, Fiyero and her; they didn't seem to care that they might end up hitting Dorothy and the others gathered at the opposite end of the hall- they didn't even seem to realize that anyone was there. They simple raised their guns and prepared to fire. "RELEASE YOUR HOSTAGES!" roared the only officer among the guards- safely position at the back of the platoon. "LOWER YOUR WEAPONS AND SURRENDER IMMEDIATELY OR WE WILL OPEN FIRE!"

Could she deflect so many bullets at once?

When was the last time she'd seriously had to deal with massed gunfire? A year ago? A year and a half? In any case, she was almost certainly rusty after all that time.

"LAST WARNING: RELEASE YOUR HOSTAGES OR WE WILL FIRE!"

Elphaba glanced in the direction of Glinda and Fiyero, who were still standing beside her. "You heard him," she hissed.

"What?"

"They think I'm holding you hostage; if you stay here, they might just end up shooting you too."

"Let them try," said Fiyero confidently.

Sighing furiously, she turned to Glinda, who shook her head. "I'm not going anywhere," she said, voice calm and resolute.

"YOU HAVE FIVE SECONDS TO COMPLY!" the officer bellowed. "FIVE..."

Elphaba glanced back in the direction of Dorothy and the others: Tik-Tok and the Lion were now hastily moving Dorothy out of the line of fire, Jack obediently following them. Boq, meanwhile, stood perfectly still, his expression unreadable.

"FOUR..."

She glanced back towards the guards, and realized with a jolt of shock that Diggs, Brollan, Rasp and Javelin were still standing in the path of the guards' rifles, and had yet to move. Perhaps they simply weren't willing to abandon her, perhaps they knew they'd be singled out as accomplices to Elphaba, Brollan knew he'd be next to be killed regardless of what he said or did- either way, they refused to budge.

"THREE..."

Scanning the room, Elphaba took a deep breath: if she was going to act, if she was going to do something that could save her life and the lives of everyone else in the room, now would have to be the time; she had the broomstick in her hand by now, and she was ready to take off. She'd just have to hope that she wouldn't get too badly cut flying through the window- that she'd be able to find her way back to Glinda one day- that she'd somehow survive the witch-hunt that would ensue...

And then, just as the officer was about to yell the second-last number of the deadly countdown, a voice rang out: _"Stop!"_

Elphaba recognized the voice immediately, but she was still taken aback by the sight of Boq stepping into the line of fire, face grim and unsmiling, one hand held out in the universal gesture for "stop," the other holding his axe. "Lower your weapons and stand down," he said. "The Lion and I have the situation under control."

Now it was the officer's turn to look surprised. "Mr Tin Man- I wasn't aware that you were here-"

"Of course not. You were too busy focussing on shooting anything in range- _including Dorothy Gale."_ He gestured to the entrance behind him, where Dorothy was peering hesitantly from behind the door. "Would you have shot Glinda and his Majesty the Scarecrow too?"

"The Witch -"

"Already surrendered- while you were wasting time with secret passages, I might add. The Scarecrow kept her distracted while Tik-Tok, the Lion and I surrounded and disarmed her; Miss Glinda was making sure that she wouldn't be able to cast spells while in prison. You, on the other hand, almost screwed up the entire operation!" He took a deep breath, and considered the sheepish guardsman for a moment. "Just how many people know that the Witch is back?"

"About twenty-five, sir- not counting us, of course."

"Where are they at present?"

"Most of them returned to the palace; they're probably back at the servants' quarters-"

"Then get back to your duties," Boq snapped. "I don't want any word of this incident getting to the public; make sure it's in their best interests to stay quiet. Is that clear?"

"Yessir."

"Good. Now get moving."

Galvanized by the look of blood-freezing hatred on the Tin Man's face, the guards cleared the room with impressive speed; most simply filed back down the secret passage- the few too slow to join them before the door slammed shut being forced to leave through the main entrance (barely hiding their terrified expressions from Elphaba as they jogged past). In a matter of seconds, the chamber was entirely empty of guards.

As soon as the door had shut behind the last guard, Boq had Tik-Tok stand guard outside while he went about securing the locks. For good measure, he also blocked the secret entrance with a sofa that had been resting against the nearby wall. Once he was certain that the panel was well and truly braced shut, he let out a sigh of relief. "With any luck, that's the only other way in," he muttered.

At long last, he turned his attention to the tiny knot of figures at the centre of the audience chamber. "Tell me," he said, voice cold and probing. "Did you and Fiyero really die a year ago, or was that a hoax?"

In spite of himself, Fiyero smiled. "So you finally figured it out. Were you listening in on the conversation before we entered?"

"No... But after all the hints you dropped earlier, I'd have to be an idiot not to make a few guesses. And now this." He turned to Elphaba. "I didn't think you just a hallucination when I saw you the last time..."

It took Elphaba a moment or two to realize what he'd meant: thanks to all the chaos and confusion in the last few days, her return to the Emerald City and the rather disjointed conversation she'd had with the petrified Boq had been almost lost in the quagmire of nightmarish sights and sounds she'd experienced afterwards. "You remembered that?" she asked.

Boq laughed, a harsh, metallic sound that rattled the windowpanes. "I doubt I could forget it if I tried." He shook his head, sobering rapidly. "After what happened between us, I didn't think I'd be able to forgive you; I thought killing you would be enough to make everything right with the world. And for a while after you died- if that's what happened- I thought everything _was_ right, even if I couldn't tell... _her..._ who I really was." He sighed. "I know you think it's pathetic that I'm still obsessed after all this time- and it is... but it's all I've got left, and for a while I was happy with it. Being petrified changed all that: up until then, I'd been working so hard I hadn't really been able to think too deeply about my life, and I hadn't wanted to, either; once Mombi petrified me, I couldn't ignore everything that had happened to me.

"I spent a very long time alone with my thoughts; time-perception distortions made it even longer. When you found me, I was almost insane- and I would have gotten worse if you hadn't helped me. But while I was still paralysed and hallucinating, I had time to think about how badly my life had gone after Shiz- and how much of it was my fault in the end; I even had time to think on how much I'd hated you... and how you'd have good cause to hate me too. I know it's strange, but I never even imagined it was possible until then, that you'd think _anything _of me. But in spite of everything I'd done- breaking Nessa's heart, blaming you for saving my life, leading a witch-hunt against you- you still helped me... so I... decided to repay the debt- some of it at least."

Elphaba considered this. "We forgive each other, then," she said at last. "But what about Glinda?"

"What _about_ me?" Glinda asked perplexedly. "What happened between you two? How did you break Nessa's heart? I mean, who are you, really?"

For a moment, Boq looked as though he wanted to explain everything, to confess his true identity in much the same way as Fiyero had; maybe he thought that Glinda would finally accept him, maybe he didn't care and just wanted to let her know who he really was.

But then the moment passed, and the familiar expression of crippling shyness clouded Boq's features.

"Nobody," he said quietly. "And I think its best I stay that way."

Without meeting Glinda's eyes, he strode over to the entrance, unlocked the door and left in silence. Against her better judgement, Elphaba followed him; it wasn't too difficult to catch up with him, given that Boq wasn't so much walking as ambling directionlessly through the corridors. Nonetheless, she waited until they were well out of earshot before speaking.

"You're going to have to tell her eventually," she pointed out.

Boq sighed. "I know. And she'll hate me for it."

"Well she forgave me and Fiyero for it-"

"And that's because she loves the two of you- you're both her friends. Me? I'm nobody; she doesn't remember who Boq was, she doesn't remember our time at Shiz, she doesn't even remember that I courted Nessa at her request. I'm not even sure if anyone in Oz remembers that Boq even existed- and truth be told, I'm not sure if anyone should."

Elphaba disapprovingly crossed her arms, remembering Boq's mad tirade at the head of the witch-hunter army- how he'd sworn revenge for transforming him into a heartless tin simulacrum of the man he'd once been. "You like being the Tin Man, now?" she asked coldly.

"It took a long time," he admitted. "In the early days, I was even thinking of forcing you to change me back into a human. But I realized that when you can't be hurt, you stop thinking about all the little aches and pains and worries most people suffer from. For a while, I thought I was invincible in every way, that there was nothing in the world that could possibly hurt me, that there was nothing left to be afraid of... right up until I tried to tell Glinda the truth." Boq hung his head in shame, and it could have been Elphaba's imagination, but she thought she saw the faintest hint of tears in his metal eyes. "Mombi was right," he said sadly. "I _am_ a coward- and I don't think being human... or loved... would make me any better."

He offered a weak smile. "Thank you," he whispered. Then, without another word, he shuffled away, disappearing around the corner.

Elphaba returned to the audience chamber in a daze: it seemed that the week could only get more eventful by the minute, she reflected, and in ways even she couldn't predict. After all, she'd told herself she'd never return to Oz, and yet here she was, wandering the corridors of the Wizard's former palace and sending maids and valets scurrying for cover with every step. Somehow, she'd ended up being forgiven by both Glinda _and_ Boq; somehow, the Nome King had been defeated; and somehow- impossibly enough- the future looked surprisingly optimistic.

While Elphaba been talking with Boq, Glinda had been conducting the various introductions as best she could: the confusion in the room was still so thickly layered you could probably cut it with a bread knife, but on the upside, the two groups now knew each others' names.

"But how do you and the Witch know each other so well?" Dorothy was asking Fiyero. "You were hugging each other a minute ago."

"That," said Fiyero, "Is a very long story."

"And I don't think that's the only question you have, is it?" Elphaba added. "You'd best get comfortable-"

There was a knock at the door: it turned out to be one of the palace servants, bearing a message for "Dorothy Gale and the other Heroes of Oz" from some of the more prominent residents of the Emerald City. Once the messenger been reassured that the Wicked Witch wasn't about to attack him, he tentatively announced that "Dorothy Gale and her allies" were hereby requested to attend the official victory celebration in the palace ballroom, where refreshments would be available, along with numerous accolades for those heroes who had once again saved Oz, and many important decisions would be made regarding Oz's future-

"I think we can all attend in _some_ fashion," said Fiyero cautiously, "Provided of course that the staff don't end up telling every single party guest that we've got the Wicked Witch in custody."

"I have assurances from the captain of the guard that almost every servant in the palace has been apprised of the situation and sworn to secrecy, Your Highness." The servant coughed, risking a quick glance in Elphaba's direction. "Uh, what do you wish done with the Witch in the meantime? I can summon the guards if you wish to have her escorted to the palace dungeons-"

"No thank you. For the moment, I'd like you to prepare one of the guest rooms for her- that'll be her cell for the moment. Make sure she won't be disturbed."

Over the bewildered gibbering of the servant, the Lion very quietly exploded. "What the hell is going on?" he demanded. "First you and Glinda hug her, then the Tin Man lies to the palace guards to save her, now you have her jailed in a luxury bedroom. What has _she_ done to deserve all of that?"

"She saved my life," said Dorothy quietly.

A thick, leaden silence descended upon the room, crushing all attempts at discussion for the next fifteen seconds as Dorothy explained how Elphaba had given her those few crucial hints on how to win the game, even facing petrifaction to do so.

"And why did you do that?" said the Lion, eyeing Elphaba suspiciously.

Once again, the servant coughed loudly for attention. "I-I think that the answers may have to wait for later, Mr Lion; my orders insist that you and the others be made presentable for the celebration within the next hour." The words _"because you clearly aren't presentable now,"_ remained tactfully unspoken, but it was clear from the look on the servant's face that he didn't think much of the group's current look: Glinda, her hair a bird's nest, her eyes tired and blue-ringed, her dress in tatters and covered in layer after layer of dust, dirt and blood; Tik-Tok, badly tarnished and squeaking loudly whenever he moved; Javelin, still painted bright red and also covered with dust; the Lion, mane tangled and matted, his paws soaked with dried blood... even Dorothy was looking a bit worn around the edges. "Baths will be made available," the servant continued, "along with new clothes for those in need of them. There will also be a polishing service available for the Tin Man, Tik-Tok and," he coughed again, "Anyone else in this group with other metallic... accoutrements."

Elphaba, who hadn't been within a mile of heated water or any other fixture of indoor plumping for the last week, stepped forward eagerly. "I know I'm not going to be attending this party, but I don't suppose it'd be too much trouble to arrange a bath for me too?"

The servant- along with Dorothy and the Lion- could only gape in bewilderment.

"No, I'm not allergic to water," Elphaba sighed. "I never have been and I never will be. My death last year was a hoax from beginning to end. Now can you _please_ run a bath and have someone launder my clothes before they grow legs and walk away on their own?"

* * *

Elphaba found the bath impossibly luxurious: it wasn't just the fact that she'd spent the last week or so wandering through ruins, wastelands, forests, condemned buildings and charnel houses without washing or changing her clothes; back at the house on the edge of the Deadly Desert, bathing had been a bit of trial even after she'd learned how to make her own soap and heat the water via magic, mainly because the bath had had been little more than a cheap tin washtub. Here, in the gleaming en-suite of her new luxury apartment, she had all the comforts one could ask for in a bathroom- and then some.

By now, the dirt and filth caked on her body was almost a second skin, and washing it all off at long last brought a relief that she could only compare to her brief stint as a reptile back in the Nome King's study; up until she finally rid herself of it in the perfumed waters of the bath, she honestly hadn't realized what a horrendous stink she'd managed to acquire in the last couple of days. The waters themselves were something of a miracle: she didn't know what alchemical compounds had been added to the water, but her body seemed to forget everything it had been afflicted with over the last few days- to the point that after a while of soaking, she was so relaxed that she very nearly dozed off- and probably would have if the distant sound of fireworks hadn't roused her.

Eventually, she rose, drying herself with a towel that felt more like a badly-disguised animal pelt and donning the clothes that had been provided for her (all of them black, appropriately). For the next few minutes, she drifted about the massive apartment, quietly unpacking her belongings and setting them out on shelves and desks. Thanks to the public's overwhelming terror at their return, quite a few of the freshly-resurrected Flying Monkeys also taken up residence here, and were now joyfully capering around Elphaba's heels, happy to see their keeper and friend once more.

However, Elphaba wasn't exactly in a mood to join in the festivities.

It hadn't quite registered with her yet that this room was likely going to be her new home from here on: there was something curiously illusory about the place, not to mention virtually every single event that had led her here- a sense that she'd was about to wake up any second. And even once the reality of the place began to hit home, a few quiet doubts continued to gnaw at her: after all, just because she was now under the protection of the King of Oz didn't guarantee her safety in the apartment; people still hated her- as if they would ever really stop- and when the servants weren't cowering in fear, they were glowering with hatred and frustration. How long would it take for someone to decide that the Scarecrow and the Tin Man had been bewitched, and that the only way to break the spell was to kill her? How long would it take for someone to leak the story to the public and send an angry mob marching towards the palace? And what about the Nomes? The Emerald City was readorned with the jewels that had caused the invasion in the first place; did that mean that the Nomes had lost their national treasures all over again? Was there going to be _another_ invasion because of that? And what had happened to Basalt? Would whatever happened to him have any impact on Oz in the future?

Elphaba sat down heavily in an over-cushioned armchair, and briefly toyed with the notion that everything would be fine. It didn't work, of course: having spent so much time expecting the very worst to happen at a moment's notice, the habit was too ingrained to be rid of very easily. On the upside, Fiyero had talked the guards into letting her keep the broomstick, so at least she still had a measure of freedom.

And then, as she was considering a walk through the palace halls- just to test how far the guards would let her roam- someone knocked at the door. Padding through the improbably thick carpet, she opened the door, half expecting to find an angry mob of servants armed to the teeth with pitchforks and torches.

Instead, she found Dorothy.

Judging by the trails of conversation fading away on the breeze, the guards stationed by the door had been trying to convince Dorothy that she shouldn't talk to "The Witch" or even get within thirty yards of her. The appearance of the Witch herself killed the warning and almost all nearby sounds, making Dorothy's whisper of "Can I come in?" sound like an explosion in the cryptlike silence of the hallway.

Elphaba nodded, stepping aside to allow Dorothy into the plush apartment and gently shutting the door behind her. She was vaguely aware that the girl was holding something behind her back, but truth be told, she was too tired to look for herself.

For about thirty seconds, the two of them stood in silence, neither of them sure what to say or do next except perhaps stare at the floor. Eventually, though, Dorothy worked up the courage to ask, "Why did you help me?"

This wasn't exactly unexpected: from the moment she'd seen her standing in the doorway of the audience chamber, Elphaba had been waiting for this particular question to crop up sooner or later. "Because you were the only person who could have stopped the Nome King," she said simply. "If he'd won the game, there'd be no telling what he'd do with the power he'd gain from it."

"But you... you _hugged _me," said Dorothy. "You forgave me, you said that what the King did with the Ruby Slippers wasn't my fault, you... if you only wanted to stop the King, you wouldn't have needed to do all that."

"No, I don't think I would have."

"Then why? A year ago, you hated me, you wanted to kill me; what made you change your mind?"

"Do you know why I hated you in the first place, Dorothy?"

"Well... you blamed me for what happened to your sister and for having the Ruby Slippers-"

"Exactly: as far as I could tell, you were the only person I could hold responsible, _and_ you were wearing the only thing I had left to remember my sister by." She sighed. "And then the Wizard's guards caught Fiyero..."

Dorothy's eyes lit up. "The Tin Man called the Scarecrow that a while ago- is that his real name?"

Elphaba nodded quietly. "At the time, I thought they'd killed him- or that I'd killed him by casting all those spells while trying to save his life. The grief and rage I felt at everything that day almost drove me mad: it had to go somewhere, it had to find a target-"

"Me?"

"Sad but true. It wasn't until later that I learned the truth about who was behind Nessa's death, that Fiyero was still alive; by the time I left Oz, most of the anger I'd targeted at you was gone. A year rebuilding my life outside Oz swept away the rest. And when I finally saw you again, you weren't my enemy anymore; you were being used by the Nome King, just like I was."

There was a pause, as Dorothy appeared to consider this. Then, she held out the objects she'd been hiding behind her back: the Ruby Slippers, still glittering with magic, but no longer surrounded by the same malignant glow they had back in the King's study.

"I'm sorry I had to take them again," she said quietly.

"It's alright..." Elphaba began, reaching out to take the slippers; however, as her fingers tightened around the bejewelled fabric, she felt the magic contained within them once again, and realized that something had changed. The last time she'd seen the Ruby Slippers in the presence of the Nome King, their energy had been overpowering, almost tangible, and there'd been enough of it to lend some credence to Roquat's self-deifying claims. Now, the energy was more akin to a jolt of static electricity; there was still magic here, but there was barely a quarter of it left. True, it was growing again, but there was no sign that it would reach the apocalyptic proportions that it had possessed before- not within the next year or two. A cursory examination of the Slippers revealed a slowly-healing wound in their thaumaturgical make-up- as if something (likely the Nome King's death and the collapse of his spirit) had torn them open on a purely metaphysical level and allowed the magic within to spill out all at once.

_Probably the only reason why the magic didn't drive the girl as mad as the Nome King,_ she thought bemusedly.

Meanwhile, Dorothy had sat down in one of the armchairs, and was now staring out the window, her gaze tired and unfocussed. "I tried to use them after the Nome King died," she said quietly. "I mean, I thought if he'd been able to take over Oz with the Slippers, maybe I'd be able to put things right with them. And it worked: on the way back here, I saw it work, I _felt_ it work- the Emerald City's back to normal, whole other cities and towns are back to normal, the forests are gone, the people are alive again, Mombi's caged up in the dungeons- but the work's only half-finished. I tried to fix all of Oz, but halfway through, the power just trickled away. Out there, it's still night even though it should be daytime; out there, whole cities are still in ruins; out there, there's places where rivers have turned to blood, the air's turned into oceans, the earth's crumbled into nothing, and people have been turned into... _monsters..._ there some parts of Oz where people are still petrified, where there's these..." She stopped, grasping for the right word. "Rips," she decided at last. _"Rips _in the air, and they keeping eating people alive, and and and..." She blinked rapidly, and took a very deep breath. "You can see the fires in the distance," she said, voice shaking with mingled grief and anger. "You can smell the blood in the air if you stand at the top of the battlements. Oz is still _burning-_ it's happening _right_ outside the Emerald City and... and nobody cares! _They're still celebrating!"_

She took another deep breath.

"That's nothing new to Oz," Elphaba murmured sadly. "When I faked my death, the celebrations carried on for days on end- even though nobody knew what they were going to do now that the Wizard had left the country; halfway through my rebellion against the government, they stopped everything for a day just to celebrate- just to show that they could in spite of how scared they were. And when Animals were being fired from their jobs and vanishing off the streets, the people kept celebrating the reign of their glorious Wizard just because they didn't want to imagine that anything could possibly be wrong. This country celebrates _only_ when it wants to divorce itself from reality a little further."

Dorothy looked at her curiously. "I never asked your name," she said thoughtfully. "When I was here last, I just thought "Witch" was enough- I don't know why."

"Not your fault: few Ozians know I even had a name."

"What is it?"

"Elphaba Thropp- or "Elphie" as Glinda prefers it."

Dorothy's eyebrows rose: clearly "Elphaba" hadn't been on her list of suspected names for the Wicked Witch of the West. "How did you become a witch?" she asked tentatively. "I mean, you make it sound as though there's a lot more than I ever thought there was, and... well, you're not exactly as wicked as I thought you were."

"Are you sure you want to know? It's a very long story."

"Well, it's either that or I'll spend the rest of my life wondering who you really were."

Not for the first time, Elphaba was slightly taken aback at how readily she decided to tell her story: maybe it was just a simple urge to explain herself which had been denied for too long by the rest of Oz; maybe it was just Dorothy starting to grow on her. Whatever the case, she sat down and started to tell her the story of her life.

Just as Fiyero had back downstairs in the audience chamber, Elphaba kept no secrets: she told Dorothy almost everything that had set her on the path to becoming a witch; she told her of how she'd been born green-skinned thanks to the Wizard's affair with her mother; she told her a little of her childhood, of her early sparks of magical power and her duties in protecting Nessarose; she told her about her time at Shiz, her tentative friendships with Glinda and Fiyero, and her discovery of the Animal Rights crisis; she described her first visit to the Emerald City, her first meeting with the Wizard and the rebellion that had followed; and she described how things had all gone wrong- Boq's transformation, the near-collapse of her friendship with Glinda, Nessa's death, the loss of Fiyero, and her faked death. And at Dorothy's urging, she continued the story, finally ending with her battle with the Nome King.

It took almost an hour.

And then, as she sat back, tired and thirsty, Dorothy began to talk: she told her a little about her life in Kansas- a world as strange and alien to Elphaba as Oz was to Dorothy; the twister that had taken her to Oz and left the farm a shambles in its wake; the mounting poverty of her family; her waking dreams, fits of insomnia, and obsession with Oz- which eventually got her sent to a mental institution for "electric healing," as the doctors called it; she even told her of how she escaped the facility, only to be swept away by a flooding river and washed up in Oz.

With both of their stories told, the two of them lapsed into silence- a silence which was almost immediately broken by a servant knocking on the door to tell them that the celebrations would begin in the next ten minutes.

Gumbling wearily to herself, Elphaba handed Dorothy the Ruby Slippers. "You'd best wear these," she said- unable to disguise the reluctance in her voice.

"But they're yours-"

"And the crowd saw you arrive in the city wearing them: if they see you without them, they'll ask questions- and now that I'm meant to be keeping a low profile, I've got to keep away from unwanted questions."

Dorothy bit her lip. "I'll give them back to you afterwards," she said, as she hastily buckled them on. "I promise."

However, as she passed the guards on her way out of the room, she asked one of them, "Is there any way for Elphaba to watch the celebration without anyone knowing? I'm just saying if it's as important as everyone's saying it is..."

* * *

Minutes later, Elphaba was standing in an observation chamber overlooking the crowded ballroom below, watching the partygoers take their places about the room with only a two-way mirror between her and discovery.

According to the guard posted at the entrance to the chamber- once she'd been able to coax a response out of him, of course- this place had been specifically designed to allow the Wizard's spies to keep a bird-eye-view of suspicious guests at diplomatic functions. Now that the Wizard was gone (or so the guard thought) and the spies weren't often used, it was now used almost exclusively for storage, which probably accounted for the boxes that Elphaba was now surrounded by. On the other hand, there was no denying that she had a perfect view of the goings-on below.

If the city had been restored to its former glory, then the ballroom (which had been almost untouched by the carnage of the Nome Invasion) now looked even more beautiful than before, especially since it was no longer being used as a throne room by Mombi- and Mombi herself was locked in a cage and being dragged into position at the back of the room by a crowd of jeering citizens. Not long after that, Glinda hovered into view, surrounded by hordes of adoring fans; after a brief return to her normal grooming regimen and a change of clothes, she was almost indistinguishable from her bubbly, pre-Kiamo Ko days.

The procession of heroes came next, filing into the room to thunderous applause from the gathered crowds: at the head of the group was Dorothy, smiling as best as she could for the masses, the Ruby Slippers on her feet, and Billina clutched in her arms; Fiyero, as King, marched alongside her; Tik-Tok and Boq took up the second line, whilst Jack and the Lion took up the third rank; much to his amusement, the Gump's head was now being carried around on a cushion behind the others. Even to Elphaba it was a dazzling display- in part because almost everyone had made to look as grandiose as possible: Boq and Tik-Tok looked especially impressive with their metal bodies polished and shining brightly under the chandeliers.

Eventually, they reached the front of the hall, where Mombi's old throne still sat; and as Dorothy took her place in front of it, the crowd began to yell: they weren't just cheering her- they were shouting a very specific message.

"DOROTHY FOR QUEEN!"

"You've got to be kidding me," Elphaba growled quietly.

Were they booting Fiyero off the throne _already?_ He'd been King for less than a week, and they were replacing him with a girl who didn't want the job, wasn't a native of Oz, and wasn't all that qualified for the post anyway.

Thankfully, Dorothy seemed to be intent on voicing those sentiments as well: it was difficult to hear her over the roar of the crowd, but most of her statements seemed to be along the lines of "I can't be queen, I have a family back in Kansas to return to," or "I can't be queen, you need someone better than me."

And then, even from her position high above the crowd, Elphaba saw the Ruby Slippers on Dorothy's feet suddenly glow.

The room fell silent.

In the mirror behind Dorothy, something was moving: at first, it was little more than a shimmering, indistinct shape, more akin to vapour than anything else. But as Dorothy turned, it began to slowly coalesce into a shape that looked almost human; then, with another brief flicker of energy, it _was_ human- a reflection in the mirror and little more, but still recognizably human. It was a girl, not much older than Dorothy, dressed in a magnificent emerald gown. Slowly, she reached up towards the surface of the mirror, as if she were on the opposite side of a window and begging to be let inside; then, Ruby Slippers glowing with what little magic they had left, Dorothy reached out, _into the mirror itelf_, the surface instantly as permeable as water. Tentatively, she grasped the child's hand, slowly drawing her out of the mirror and into the real world.

Bowing to Dorothy in thanks, the girl looked out at the surrounding crowd, her angelic face and the blonde tresses instantly captivating them. Maybe it was the way her eyes seemed to glow a vivid emerald as they swept across the room, maybe it was the look of unnatural calm on her face, but Elphaba knew that whoever this girl was, she wasn't entirely human.

And then she finally announced her name.

Jack let out a yelp of _"Mom!" _and collapsed backwards into the crowd.

Mombi backed into the furthermost corner of her cage and covered her face with her hands.

And Elphaba could only watch in disbelief as Ozma, rightful Queen of Oz, returned to her throne.

* * *

A/N: Next Up: THE FINAL CHAPTER.


	37. Epilogue: Under New Management

A/N: Well ladies and gents, here it is: the final chapter. I hope you've enjoyed this long and deranged story of mine. I've had a lot of fun writing it and reading your reviews, but alas, all good things must come to an end. With any luck, this conclusion to The Shattering of Oz will wrap up the dangling plot threads in a suitably fulfilling manner. So, without further ado, read, review and above all, enjoy!

Disclaimer: Oz, Wicked, and Return to Oz do not belong to me.

PS: I hope nobody minds me tinkering with Ozma's backstory a little for the purposes of the story; I realize it deviates from what was said at the end of Return to Oz, but once again, I feel it's the only way to deal with the explaination without having yet another Ozian government official lie to Dorothy.

* * *

For the next few minutes, the crowd stood in rapt silence as Ozma explained herself:

The only surviving member of the ancient dynasty that had ruled Oz prior to the Wizard's coup, the girl had spent her earliest years being hastily transported from one sanctuary to another under a variety of different identities- at one point, she'd even been magically disguised as a boy. Her guardians had been the only allies of the old royal family left in the country: these disenfranchised servants became both surrogate parents and teachers to Ozma, grooming her for power in the vague and desperate hope that she might one day be able to retake the throne. Then, when she turned seven years old, the last of her retainers died, leaving her alone; for a time, she'd wandered the countryside, looking for help, not even bothering to keep her identity a secret anymore.

Unfortunately, the first person who she'd encountered had been none other than Mombi, freshly-graduated and already simmering with resentment: she'd taken the child in, partly because she needed a servant but mostly because it meant there'd finally be someone lower than her on the pecking order. For almost four years, the witch bullied, belittled and tormented Ozma without mercy, blissfully unaware that even as she went on experimenting with magic, the child she so casually abused was watching- and learning. Then, after four years of suffering in silence, Ozma finally plucked up her courage and retaliated, creating Jack Pumpkinhead to frighten Mombi. Enraged that her ward had dared to rebel, Mombi had imprisoned her within an enchanted glass sphere and left her there until a suitably monstrous punishment could be devised. For good measure, she'd put Jack in suspended animation- a state he'd remain in until the invasion.

Just a few days after the hellish imprisonment began, the Nome King discovered them; drawn to the isolated hovel by the constant flickering of magic, he'd been looking for allies and resources in his attempt to conquer Oz and achieve godhood, having yet to find the Ruby Slippers. Though he'd accepted Mombi's services, he'd also ordered that Ozma remain sealed inside the prison sphere: though he'd caught glimpses of impressive magic potential within the girl, he'd also learned of her upbringing, and feared that she'd be too loyal to her birthright to ever willingly join forces with him.

So, Ozma had remained trapped for the next decade whilst the King went about arranging his route to dominance over Oz and the Nome Dominions. Because daylight couldn't penetrate the walls of the sphere, and because the elaborate magic of her prison prevented her from aging, Ozma's only way of marking time was the muffled ticking of the clock across from her perch. Captivity would have driven her to insanity had she not been listening so closely to the conversations beyond the walls of her prison, or become so immersed in the study of the spells she'd learned while in Mombi's company- spells that she slowly learned to master, allowing her to- after a fashion- see the world beyond her prison.

Perhaps a week ago, Ozma had been disturbed by a jostling and shaking from the outside word- tremors which she later learned could have only been caused by the Nomes' attack on the Emerald City. Scant hours later, she'd found herself flung from the depths of the prison sphere; alas, she'd had less than a moment to enjoy her freedom before being abruptly sealed inside one of the ballroom mirrors. This time, her jailers were much more careful: with the Nome King dictating the terms of the prison, more emphasis was placed on keeping the captive properly suppressed this time; enchanted into submission, and prevented from using clairvoyance, scrying, or any one of the few dozen other techniques that could cast her mind beyond the boundaries of the mirror, Ozma's imprisonment was eternal and inescapable.

Almost.

Mombi had been too busy gloating over her new palace or preoccupied with experiments to notice that the Nome King's foray between worlds had done Ozma an unexpected favour. In the form of an insubstantial wraith, she'd travelled beyond Oz in a desperate attempt to find someone able to save the country. Eventually, following the trail of the key between dimensions, she'd found Dorothy; realizing just how interested the Nome King seemed in the child, she did her best to alter and sabotage his plans as best as she could- summoning Bilina to Dorothy's side, or guiding her to the new secret entrance. And through little more than luck, her gambit had paid off: thanks to Dorothy, Oz had been restored...

"... and I have been freed," Ozma finished.

There was a bewildered muttering from the crowd; it was hard to tell exactly who started applauding first, but wherever it began, within the next ten seconds, the entire room was shouting Ozma's name.

Far above the ballroom, Elphaba could only stare down at the cheering masses below in utter confusion: she'd heard of the monarchs that had ruled Oz before Diggs had come to power- who hadn't? – but to see the last scion of the family appear in front of her was almost unbelievable, even by the standards of the last week or so. And more to the point, what was this girl's agenda? Was she _really_ only after her throne? In the last few minutes of monologue, Ozma had been very selective in what she'd actually said: she'd never actually blamed the Wizard for what had happened to her, nor had she ever hinted that he'd risen to power through lies and trickery. She was quite obviously playing to the crowd, but why?

More importantly, what did her return mean for Oz and its people? What did it mean for Glinda, Fiyero and everyone else Elphaba had counted as friends and allies? What did it mean for Elphaba herself?

The commotion from below briefly increased: apparently, the topic of discussion had finally turned to just how Dorothy was supposed to return to Kansas; Dorothy herself was swiftly removing the Ruby Slippers- hastily shooting an apologetic glance up at Elphaba.

And as Ozma donned the Slippers, Elphaba felt the magic suddenly billowing through the room: a powerful teleportation spell was being readied- enough to send Dorothy back to her world for the second time in a row. At first, the spell was little more than a faint glow around the Slippers on Ozma's feet; then, a moment later, the glow now surrounded Dorothy Gale, lifting her into the air as the magic of the spell began to disassociate her from local reality. The audience began to shout their farewells, Dorothy tearfully waving goodbye in return... and as she did so, Elphaba couldn't help but notice that, in the last few moments before she disappeared entirely, Dorothy was looking up at her.

It could have been Elphaba's imagination, but she swore that Dorothy mouthed the words "thank you," in that final split-second.

Then she was gone.

Elphaba absently wiped away a tear, and wondered what was going to happen next. As she did so, she happened to look back down at the ballroom- only to find Ozma gazing up at her.

Even at a distance, even with the protection that the two-way mirror _should _have provided, there was no mistaking the look of recognition in the child-monarch's eyes.

Ozma had _seen_ her.

* * *

"What do you suppose she's going to do with us?" Glinda whispered.

"Good question. I suppose it depends entirely on how much she's been told in the meantime; judging by the people who've turned up to advise the girl, I'm dead."

"Me too."

"What?"

"If you think I'm just going to sit in a corner and listen while they have you executed-"

"They'll kill you as well-"

"Let them try-"

"Would you two _please_ shut up so I can panic in silence?" Diggs whispered. Ever since the return of Ozma had been announced to the rest of the palace, the former Wizard had been growing more and more agitated with every passing minute; his attitude hadn't made much of an improvement when, less than three hours after the coronation was over, it had been announced that Glinda and "her allies" were to report to the audience chamber immediately for a meeting with Her Royal Highness, Queen Ozma the Returned. By the time the others had arrived outside the double doors to the chamber, Diggs had turned a sickly concrete grey and was now sweating copiously. In fact, had he been able to, he'd have probably made a run for it the moment the announcement had been made, had it not been for the current state of his legs- and the fact that he was now flanked by guards at all times.

"What the hell are you worrying about?" Elphaba demanded. "It's not as if she can just have you put on trial and executed- people would recognize you."

"Oh, wonderful: I don't have to worry about _public _executions anymore; she can just have the guards cut my throat and fling me into a ditch. That makes me feel _so_ much better. I mean, it's not as if she'll want revenge or anything like that, will she? Jesus Christ, this is going to be even worse than meeting the Nome King again. I mean, true, I good as ruined his kingdom, but I didn't actually ruin his life- not directly anyway: I didn't make _his_ childhood a living hell, or make him a fugitive in his own territory. I didn't have _him_ sealed away for ten years-"

"You didn't do that to Ozma either. The Nome King did that."

"And the argument will be that I made it possible by ousting the girl from power _and_ getting the King interested from revenge."

"Why are you so worried?" Glinda said exasperatedly. "I mean, just because she's a child _and_ controlling the state doesn't mean she's going to kill you on the spot-"

"She's _not _a child! Chronologically speaking, she's at least twenty years of age, and because of the coup, she had to spend half of her life inside a glass bauble. So, logically speaking, what we have on the throne is a girl with the body of a child, the intelligence of a grown woman, and the hunger for vengeance of an escaped convict! Face it- I'm screwed from beginning to end."

"Well, that makes three of us," Elphaba mused; she was surprised at the airy tone she'd managed to carry at that point: it almost made her sound relaxed about the meeting that was to follow. Of course, she wasn't, but first impressions were everything at this point. If Ozma was going to have her tried and executed, she might as well meet the jury with a brave face.

It was at that moment that the doors swung ominously open, and Elphaba, Glinda, Diggs, Rasp, Woolwax, Javelin and Brollan were escorted into the audience chamber.

However, the hordes of jeering spectators she'd expected to find were absent; in fact, there were only a couple of dozen people in the chamber: the guards that had escorted them in, the guards protecting the throne, a few minor officials and functionaries, Fiyero, Boq, and of course, Ozma. But it was Ozma's reaction to their arrival that Elphaba found the most curious: whereas the guards and bureaucrats wore the same expression of mingled hatred and terror reserved exclusively for the Wicked Witch of the West, Ozma looked surprisingly calm- as if she recognized Elphaba by sight.

Within ten feet of the throne, Elphaba and the others were immediately surrounded by another row of bayonet-wielding guards- but even thought they obligingly pointed their weapons at Brollan, Rasp and Diggs, it was clear that they were really aiming at the resident Wicked Witch; once again, there was no mistaking the hatred on their faces- or what they intended to do next.

Then, someone cocked their rifle, the _click_ of a bolt hammering into place echoing wildly across the cavernous audience chamber; milliseconds later, everyone was shouting: Elphaba was demanding that Glinda to be spared, Glinda was yelling that Elphaba was innocent, Diggs was begging for mercy, Rasp and Javelin were trying to negotiate, Woolwax and Brollan were snarling baroque death-threats, FIyero and Boq were desperately ordering the guards to stand down, the guards were screaming at Glinda and the others to step away from the witch, and the remaining civilians were, of course, howling for Elphaba's blood. About the only person in the room who wasn't making some kind of noise was none other than Ozma, who remained as serene and phlegmatic as ever.

Just it seemed that the noise wouldn't end without someone opening fire, the child-monarch raised a hand, and with a flourish of magic, the audience chamber was plunged into silence.

"Stand down," she ordered.

"... what?" said the guard captain helplessly.

"Lower your weapons and stand down; the Witch is not to be harmed, nor are her compatriots."

"But your highness, she's-"

"I am well aware of this. Your dedication to your work is impressive, captain, but I do not wish to see the situation escalate as of yet. You may stand down."

With much reluctance, the guards lowered their bayonets and returned to their places flanking the throne. As they did so, a harried-looking servant emerged from the double doors, carrying a massive stack of papers; sprinting across the room at a speed that would have bewildered Javelin, the servant quickly distributed the papers to the room at large, turned on his heel and scurried away without a word of explanation. Peering down at the paper that had arrived in her hands, Elphaba realised that it was actually some kind of legal form; in fact, it looked suspiciously like a _contract._

"Officially speaking, the events of this conference are strictly classified and not for public distribution," Ozma explained. "The documents that you have been provided with are to ensure that those who participate in this meeting do not constitute a security breach; if you sign them, you will be legally and magically obliged to remain silent as to what happened here: enchantments will ensure that you will be unable to speak of this to anyone except myself, those who have also signed a contract here, or those with the appropriate security clearance; in the event that you break the enchantment, _we will know, _and we will be within our rights to prosecute you to the fullest extent of the law. Is this understood?"

There was a hesitant mumbling of agreement from the crowd.

"Good. You may now sign."

After much awkward scribbling, the signed contracts were hastily collected by another harried-looking bureaucrat, and the grumbling onlookers finally fell silent; it was clear that nobody could guess at what was going to happen next, but judging by the looks of mingled anticipation and apprehension on the faces of the spectators, nobody doubted that it was going to be earth-shattering.

"Now, to business," said Ozma. "Firstly, regarding the Witch-"

"And her execution?" finished one of the nearby officials, the hope in his voice almost palpable. There was a muttering of "hear hear" from the crowd.

Ozma looked puzzled. "For what reason in particular?" she asked, innocently.

The chorus of "hear hear" ended abruptly, plunging the room into an incredulous silence- broken only by the sound of Glinda trying desperately not to laugh. Eventually, someone in the crowd burst out, "She's the _Wicked Witch of the West,_ your highness!"

"I am well aware of this fact, but is there any particular crime you wish to charge her with at present: under the current government's laws, I find little to accuse her of."

"Your highness, she has been opposed to Oz itself since she first declared herself a witch! She encouraged uprisings among the Animal population, she disrupted vital medical research throughout Oz, she threatened to destroy the Wizard's government-"

"The accusations made by the Wizard and his court do not concern me at present," said Ozma, suddenly cold and unsmiling. "Apart from disturbing the peace, reckless endangerment and a few instances of justifiable homicide, this woman is innocent; services to the crown negate most of the offences that she _has_ committed."

"Services perf..." One of the nearest bureaucrats took a deep breath. "Your highness, perhaps in your long absence from Oz, you have been left uninformed as to what the Witch was responsible for; I mean, apart from the use of evil magic to secure her return to life-"

Ozma snapped her fingers and as if by magic, a servant hurried from the back of the room towards Elphaba; as he pattered close, she noticed that he was holding a glass of water sitting on it. Before the disbelieving eyes of the spectators, Elphaba accepted the glass and drank the water in a single gulp.

Ozma smirked. "Her death was a clever hoax, as I recall. Meanwhile, I am no less uninformed as to what she is responsible for, given that I watched almost every minute of it. The Nome King was not the only one observing Oz over the last ten years. And I am also aware that the Witch actually has a name: Elphaba Thropp, unless I'm surely mistaken."

In spite of every last bit of anti-authoritarian sentiment that she'd gathered over the years, Elphaba actually found herself curtseying.

"But... but..." The gaggle of bureaucrats by the throne was a flurry of whispered argument for the next few seconds, before one of them finally stood forward. "You said the Witch-"

Ozma coughed pointedly.

"... sorry. You said... _Miss Thropp_... had performed services to the crown-"

"Indeed- if the testimony of secretary Rasp's entourage is any evidence."

"Entourage?" Rasp echoed.

Ozma held up a small stack of papers. "In the last few hours, we have received many telegrams from across Oz; most of them are incident reports regarding the current state of the country and shall be spoken of later, but the ones that concern us now are those sent by a small group of Munchkins found in the ruins of the governor's mansion, all of them asking what had happened to Mr Woolwax and Miss Thropp. When asked, they actually reported that had been part of a resistance movement- led by you, Mr Rasp- against the Nome Invasion- and that the Wicked Witch of the West had been one of their allies." She smiled. "These are not the only reports of Miss Thropp's involvement. The Scarecrow and the Tin Man have been informing me of her past exploits- some of them related to them by Dorothy Gale herself- all of them indicating that, while not entirely loyal to the government, she has indeed been an ally to Oz and its people. I think that more than warrants the acceptance of Miss Thropp by this court, yes?"

There was a reluctant chorus of mumbled agreement from the crowd. Some, however, remained unconvinced. "You are that sure that Miss Thropp can be trusted, your highness?"

"The fact that I am here to answer these questions should be evidence enough: Miss Thropp was instrumental in ensuring the downfall of the Nome King and my release from captivity."

"Wha-"

"It will be explained in detail later. But for the moment, we must discuss Miss Thropp's future employment."

Now it was Elphaba's turn to look incredulous. "You want to give me a job? After what happened _last time?"_

Ozma sighed. "Miss Thropp, it's no secret to the general public that, at present, the country is dangerously unstable. The Nome King might not have been able to destroy Oz altogether, but there's no denying that he undoubtedly left his mark on the land in more ways than one." She held up the stack of telegrams. "The Emerald City may have been rebuilt, but others still lie in ruins. Hundreds of thousands have been restored to life, but thousands more are still dead. The day and night cycles of the land are currently in disarray... And we have reports of all manner of magical distortions and collapses from one end of the country to the next: fields of broken glass a thousand yards across; rivers of blood and wells of bile; literally bottomless pits; rainclouds causing involuntary transformations; the ever-popular rifts in the fabric of the space-time continuum; areas where time itself runs in reverse, or where gravity is disabled, or where the laws of perspective have failed, or where the ground has turned into ocean and the people have turned into fish- the list goes on and on. Now, we have already sent envoys to Ev and other lands beyond Oz for aid in assisting those who have lost their homes or worse to the reality breakdown; however, we require a means of directly repairing the damage and making the afflicted areas habitable again- and the only reliable method we have found is, of course, magic."

Elphaba blinked. "There's nobody else in the country that can do this?"

"Regrettably, magical tuition has dwindled over the last ten years: according to statistics, Shiz University is the only institution still in the business of teaching magic, and in an extremely limited fashion. The number of adepts remaining on Ozian soil is, of course, correspondingly low- and likely even lower thanks to the Nome Invasion. At this time, you and Glinda are the only ones capable of dealing with the problem."

"What, clearing away reality distortions?"

"No- though that will be part of your duties. It is apparent that there is too much damage for two witches to repair alone- not without prolonging out the repair process for years and leaving thousands of people to suffer in the meantime. No, what we need are more magicians, especially ones that can neutralize reality breakdowns. We want you and Glinda to tutor the next generation of magical adepts."

Glinda's jaw dropped. "You want us to be _teachers?"_

"You will both be suitably reimbursed for your time, of course: Elphaba will receive a salary, accommodation- and, where necessary, protection... and while I might not be able to present her to the Ozian public as a hero just yet, it _may_ be possible once the political climate has had time to cool and we have time to arrange a suitable "reinvention" of your character- perhaps five to ten years at the most. How does that sound?"

Not for the first time that day, Elphaba felt the urge to lie down and fall asleep; the week had already been too eventful for her tastes, and it wasn't getting any calmer anytime soon. She took a very deep breath: "With due respect, your highness, the last time I agreed to work for the government of Oz I found out that it was the cause of the Animal rights abuses that I'd wanted to address. Can I really trust you not to do the same thing, or to make the same mistakes?"

"Would it mean anything if I told you that I would never be as brazen or corrupt as my usurper?"

"No offence, but I'm pretty sure the Nome King would have said the same thing before he went mad. I mean, what's to stop you from going the same way as him _or_ the Wizard?"

Ozma smiled eerily. "Isn't it obvious?" she asked, suggesting that it should have been perfectly clear from the beginning, whatever it was. "You are."

"I'm sorry, what?"

"You've made it clear you don't tolerate corruption from the leaders of Oz- that you'd do anything to stop tyrants and despots; what if I was to make that your official role in my government once the tuition is complete?"

Elphaba opened her mouth to reply, only to realize that she couldn't think of anything to say: could she really agree to join forces with the leadership of Oz again? Could she really be trusted to hold onto her ethics in the face of every luxury that she'd be rewarded with? True, after spending whole year in the wilderness, the prospect of living in a royal apartment with soft beds, hot water and five-star food and drink available was decidedly enticing; being rewarded for practising magic only made the deal sound sweeter still... but when it came time for her to look deeply for signs of corruption within the government, would she be able to look past every single reward she'd been given? Could she_ really_ trust herself to stay true to her principles-even after what had happened back at the Nome King's palace?

In all honesty, she would have declined the offer then and there had she not happened to turn around and get a good look at Glinda's face: if anything, the expression on that face looked almost pleading- and for good reason; after all, hadn't Ozma offered the two of them a chance to work together for the first time in a line of work neither of them could feel guilty about? Wouldn't taking this job mean that the two of them could finally be happy with what they'd made of their lives? And what about Fiyero? Accepting the deal would mean that he'd never have to endure the dangers and indignities that life in the wilderness plagued him with; it meant that he and Elphaba would never be separated again.

And then Self-Doubt once again made itself felt in her mind: _it doesn't matter how you try and dress this up,_ it snarled, _you're still going to be accepting bribes to look the other way when the girl finally goes completely mad with power. I mean, it's not as if anyone's going to be watching the watchman, is it? Who's supposed to stop _you_ from going rotten?_

But for once, Elphaba already knew the answer to that: _Fiyero and Glinda, of course..._

"Very well," she said at last. "I accept the agreement." Over the audible sighs of relief from around the room, she asked, "When am I supposed to begin work?"

"I would imagine we need a month or two to track down suitable list of candidates and prepare the coursework; in the meantime, I think you've more than earned some recuperation time." She cleared her throat, the smile suddenly vanishing from her face as she turned towards Diggs. "And now to the second order of business: the fate of my usurper."

As the crowd once again descended into a fit of bewildered whispering, Diggs reluctantly stepped forward; it was clear from the look on his face that he knew there'd be no escaping his crimes now, and though he was obviously terrified out of his life, he didn't struggle when the guards moved to restrain him. In spite of everything that the former Wizard had done, Elphaba felt a pang of sympathy for the old man once again, and wondered if she should speak up for him: after all, he'd helped them back in the Nome King's palace; without him, the battle would have been lost.

Meanwhile, the audience had finally recognized who Diggs really was; even with the innumerable scars, there was no mistaking him for anyone but the Wizard- certainly not after his grand farewell last year. And suddenly, people were begging for answers, wanting to know what the Wonderful Wizard had been accused of.

"A multitude of crimes," said Ozma, her voice cold. "First among them being the participation in a coup that removed me and my family from the throne; impersonating a magician; the persecution of Animals; political terror... the list goes on and on. Quite frankly, Mr Diggs' crimes would merit execution, at the very least, consecutive life sentences without parole..."

The room went deathly silent. Digg's eyes slid shut.

"... however, I have received numerous reports of his conduct over the last several hours and I am aware that the Nome King's defeat might not have been possible without the accused's mechanical expertise; furthermore, he has already been imprisoned for one year under deplorable conditions and suffering grievous forms of torture. With this in mind, and given the need to temper justice with practicality, I am inclined to show mercy in the sentence I pass: Oscar Zoroaster Phadrig Isaac Norman Henkel Emmannuel Ambroise Diggs, (here, Ozma briefly paused to take a very deep breath) you are hereby sentenced to twenty years of indentured servitude, and your skills as an engineer and designer shall be used to benefit the state. During this time, you shall be under strict supervision, and will not be allowed to leave your cell or access potentially dangerous materials without my permission. Also, as punishment for the impersonation of a magical practitioner, you shall be required to learn enough magic to legally qualify as a wizard."

Diggs blinked. "That's all?"

"As I said, justice should be merged with practicality; having you executed would have been a pointless waste of your abilities. Besides, I was inclined to be merciful in the case of Mombi, too: she will serve the crown just as you shall- though in a different capacity, of course."

"But how can you not be angry with me? _Insanely _angry? I mean, Elphaba gave me a chance as well, but she didn't just hand it to me on a silver platter- and certainly not as serenely as you just did."

Ozma's eyes briefly flared a vivid green, just as they had when the child had first emerged from the mirror. "My imprisonment has changed me- not in quite the same way that your time in the dungeons of the Nome King's palace changed _you, _but almost as miraculously. Perhaps I exhausted my capacity for anger and hatred in the depths of my prison; or perhaps it was simply part of what was lost when I was first dissolved into energy and poured into the sphere." She smiled sadly. "Either way, the transformation from child to monarch did not occur without cost..."

Once again, she cleared her throat- her signal to change the subject, Elphaba realised. "Now," Ozma continued, "Onto the final order of business for today: commendations and rewards for those who have aided and served Oz in its time of crisis. As I have already discussed, however, some cannot be given publically due to the sensitive nature of their deeds- I once again apologise, Elphaba. Nonetheless, there is something I _can_ give you in the meantime..."

As she spoke, servant appeared at Elphaba's side as if by magic.

In his outstretched hands, he held the Ruby Slippers.

* * *

Two hours later, the long and complicated procedure of arranging various payment packages finally came to close. All things considered, the rewards dealt to those "Heroes of Oz" had been impressive but well-deserved: Javelin, Woolwax and the other survivors of the resistance movement were in line to receive titles and awards; Brollan was to be attended by the very best of Oz's remaining magicians in the hope that they might be able to restore him to normal; and with the old governor of Munchkinland still dead, Rasp was now one of the potential candidates in line to replace him.

And now, Elphaba was finally able to stagger back to her apartment and relax; after the lunacy of the last couple of weeks, she needed at least three hours in a comfortable armchair- and a very stiff drink.

So, after managing to acquire three or four bottles of "Deadly Emerald" from the servants (most of whom didn't seem quite so inclined to run for their lives or fling jugs of water at her anymore, thankfully), she collapsed into a chair, opened the bottle, poured herself a glass, and started drinking in earnest.

The drink itself tasted like a bizarre hybrid of cranberry juice and being kicked in the head with a hobnailed boot, but at that point, Elphaba wasn't all that interested in taste: she wanted something that would loosen the knots in her brain and knock out at some point before midnight, because there was no way in hell she was ever going to get to sleep without it. She'd heard and seen and learned far too much this evening- or afternoon, or whatever the time was- to be able to properly relax on her own; there were simply too many thoughts buzzing around the inside of her skull for that. So, she was going to sit down and get pissed until she could achieve unconsciousness.

She was onto her second glass when there was a knock at the door: unsurprisingly, it was Glinda. Much more surprisingly, she was holding an oversized flute-glass in one hand and a half-empty bottle of wine in the other.

"I... uh, I couldn't sleep," she admitted. "Do you mind-"

"Of course not," said Elphaba. "It's not as if I'm going to be sleeping anytime soon, either. Come on in."

She staggered in, and after drifting across the four-inch-thick carpet, the two of them flopped into armchair, and got started on their respective beverages once again.

"So, we're under new leadership," said Glinda between sips.

"Pretty much."

"And we're going to be teachers. _Teachers._ I honestly don't know what that girl's thinking; I mean, how am I supposed to teach anyone anything?"

"Well, you do know a lot of magic, and you were always good a public speaking-"

"No, no, no, no, no- it's not the same thing, is it? The public speaking thing, that was all about lying to people. I mean, how the hell am I supposed to teach people anything worth knowing? I'm not a magical specialist like you, not really; I'm just a witch who ended up in the spotlight one too many times. Why the hell do you think the Nome King used me as an understudy?" She paused, eyeing the bottle of Deadly Emerald. "Is that any good?"

Elphaba blinked rapidly; she was on her fifth glass, and the world was already starting to look a little cheerier. "Good enough for my purposes," she remarked. "Try a glass if you like."

So, a sixth glass of Deadly Emerald was poured; once it was in Glinda's hands, though, she seemed very reluctant to actually drink it- especially after taking one sniff of it and declaring that it smelt like formaldehyde. After a lot of coaxing, she finally took a less-than-microscopic sip of the viscous green liquid... whereupon she automatically lapsed into a massive coughing fit.

"Ack!" she said loudly. "Kagrrrrddhff! Gnnnnifjeijifdj! Uurrrgh! Winunarrggle! Ack!"

"Good, isn't it?"

"Not exactly the word I'd use," Glinda wheezed. "Arg." She took a very deep breath, and then finished the glass in a single gulp. As Elphaba poured her another shot, she added, "It doesn't make any sense to me. I mean, I can understand why she'd choose you- you're a magical genius, you can understand the Grimmerie without having to translate it, you pretty much defeated the Nome King in a one-on-one duel... and I'm just baggage, really when you get around to it." She raised the glass of Deadly Emerald to her lips and downed it with a shudder. "I just don't-"

"Glinda," said Elphaba wearily, "You've got to stop doing this."

"Stop doing _what?"_

"The self-deprecation; the "everything I do is worth absolutely nothing" business. I mean, it's obviously been on your mind for everyday since I faked my death, and judging from what I saw back at the Nome King's palace, it's not doing wonders for your health. I mean, you can't stop hating yourself for things that happened over a year ago- things that were _my fault."_ Glinda opened her mouth to disagree, but Elphaba – now drunk and feeling somewhat devil-may-care – immediately reached out and put a hand over her mouth. "Just let me speak, please," she said desperately. "You are so much better than you think you are: you are very talented witch. I mean, yeah, you might have lagged behind a bit in magic class back at Shiz, but that doesn't matter; you've pretty much redeemed yourself since then. You're not stupid, okay? You just weren't all that inclined to put your brain to good use, but that _doesn't matter:_ you've changed since then-"

"No I haven't!" Glinda protested, a noticeable slur in her voice now. "I'm still a stupid selfish bitch-"

"No – you – aren't!" Elphaba shot back. "You can't start blaming and hurting yourself for this sort of thing. Just because you've made mistakes in your life doesn't mean that everything's beyond repair." She stood up, somewhat unsteadily. "I mean, we've both made mistakes, and you know what? The Wizard's no longer a danger to anyone except the royal budget, the Nome King's dead, someone vaguely reasonable is in control of Oz, and we're finally working together- just like we always wanted! We've actually triumphed for a change, and I don't know about you, but-"

At that point, Elphaba tripped backwards over a leather footrest and went tumbling to the ground. All traces of gloominess vanishing, Glinda collapsed into a fit of helpless giggling- almost hard enough to topple out of her chair and land squarely next to Elphaba on the carpet.

Suddenly, Elphaba was laughing too, not because the fall was particularly funny to her (she wasn't _that_ drunk) but because the logical conclusions of everything she'd just told her were finally slotting into place: it was true- against all the odds, they'd somehow succeeded. They were all alive, and somehow, there was something not unlike a promising future on the horizon.

After that, however, things got a little hazy: she had vague memories of Fiyero arriving at the door to join the festivities; of Glinda asking some of the servants if any of them knew how to make cocktails; there even a few vague recollections of magic being used- of Elphaba herself standing in the middle of the room, crackling prisms of thaumaturgical energy flickering between her outstretched hands as she laughed at the hilarity of it all, the last of her apprehensions forgotten.

The last thing she recalled, before she finally lost conscious- with Glinda dozing off on her left shoulder and Fiyero happily volunteering himself as a pillow for both of them- was how perfect the day had been.

* * *

"NOMES! _NOMES!" _someone was shouting.

Elphaba groaned loudly, and reluctantly pried one eyelid open; on the upside, the events of yesterday hadn't been an extremely cruel dream, and she was still slumped on the lounge with Fiyero and Glinda half-collapsed beside her. The obvious downside was that the sun was at noontime height, she was hungover, and people not too far outside the apartment were shouting about...

"Nomes," she hissed.

Lurching clumsily off the lounge, she made a beeline for the nearest window and all but flung it open. Perhaps a few hundred feet below Elphaba's apartment, the square was crowded with people, each of them trying to get a look at the figure standing at the palace steps: even at a distance, there was no mistaking the imposing figure of a Nome. Pausing only to wake up Glinda and Fiyero- and obtain a decent pair of binoculars from one of the panicked watchmen milling around in the corridor- she shut the window and made her way to the nearest balcony to get a better look a the situation.

As it turned out, the Nomes who'd just arrived weren't actually attacking the city and they weren't actually an army: in fact, there were only seven of them in total; the first was clearly a VIP of some stripe, as he wore the same overcomplicated array of jewellery and decorations that Elphaba had come to expect from Nome nobles; the second was difficult to place, for apart from some copper plating on his shoulders, he wore no obvious decorations, and was armed only with a clipboard and a briefcase; two of them were heavily-armed soldiers; the other four were workers, all of them charged with carrying the massive wrought-iron palanquin that the group had brought with them. As for the palanquin itself, there was no guessing if it had any passengers inside, for it had no windows to speak of- just an airlock door.

For the moment, the group didn't appear to be doing anything except waiting; even when a number of guards tentatively surrounded them, they showed no signs of aggression, or even vague concern. It wasn't until a portly gentleman in an expensive suit (identified by Glinda as one of Oz's foremost ambassadors) stormed out of the crowd towards them that the Nomes finally reacted; in this case, the VIP stepped forward, and- to the amazement of the crowd- spoke to him.

Because they were so far away, there was no telling what the conversation was about, but judging by the look on the ambassador's face, it had to be pretty extraordinary. After a minute of debate, they appeared to reach a decision, for clipboard-bearing Nome was allowed to pass through the cordon of guards and approach the nearest building: there, he opened his briefcase and drew from it a jeweller's loupe, a pair of tongs, and a single emerald the size of a nectarine- and suddenly the situation made perfect sense to Elphaba.

"They got Emeralds of their own after all," she remarked to no-one in particular. "Dorothy, you magnificent bitch."

"What do you mean?" Glinda asked.

"Well, when I saw that the Emerald City was rebuilt- complete with emeralds- I got a bit worried that that the Nomes might just try and attack the city all over again just to get them back. But I guess Dorothy gave the Nomes another set of emeralds to replace them while she was still using the Ruby Slippers."

Meanwhile, the Nome at the wall was conducting a very thorough inspection of the emeralds that clustered the building- and comparing them to the one he now held with the tongs. Finally, after eight minutes of studying, he put away his equipment and marched back to the VIP with his report. There was another moment of inaudible conversation, and then the VIP unexpectedly reached out and shook hands with the Ozian ambassador.

In perfect unison, Elphaba, Glinda and Fiyero sighed in relief.

The three of them were sitting down to try and recover their equilibrium, when there was a knock at the door: it was one of the palace messengers- one of the many staff-members that had been contracted to keep Elphaba's "resurrection" a secret.

For a moment, he could only hover in the door, caught between fear of Elphaba and incredulity at what had just happened. Then, he announced, "They want to talk to you."

"What?"

"The Nomes; they wanted to talk to you and Miss Glinda."

After making themselves as presentable as humanly possible and taking the few dozen flights of stairs to the ground floor, Elphaba and Glinda finally arrived in the palace entrance hall, where the Nome guests had finally set down the iron palanquin. The Nome ambassador was now deep in conversation with Ozma, apparently discussing the etiquette of visiting Nome magicians; in any case, the two witches were hastily directed away from the diplomatic conference and towards the palanquin.

"You know who it's going to be, don't you?" said Glinda quietly, as the airlock valve slowly began to turn.

"I can guess. I mean, if it's a Nome and he or she doesn't actually want us dead, then-"

"But if that's the case, then why's he in this iron box, of all things?"

"Your guess is as good as mine."

And then the airlock swung open with a bloodcurdling creak of hinges that sounded more like the last wail of a tortured ghost to anyone with the slightest bit of imagination, putting an end to conversation for the moment; hastily smothering all quiet niggling doubts as best as they could, they each took a deep breath and stepped into the stygian darkness beyond the door.

Not entirely unsurprisingly, the door slammed shut behind them.

Moments later, the interior of the palanquin was suddenly lit by an eerie blue light that could only be magical in nature; there wasn't much of interest within the wrought-iron chamber that Elphaba and Glinda had found themselves in, however: the walls, floors and ceiling were kept bare and sterile as possible, and apart from the viewing windows that the occupant of the palanquin no doubt used to survey the area, there wasn't much in the way of creature comforts. But it was the occupant that drew their gaze.

He'd changed little since the last time they'd seen him: perhaps there were a few vague epaulette-like decorations to his rocky shoulders, perhaps he was a little taller than before; it was hard to tell, especially given that he was seated now. As a matter of fact, he was seated in a vast throne of copper wire and iron plating, his limbs firmly strapped to the arms and legs of the chair; in a measure that looked a little like overkill to Elphaba's eyes, he was also chained to the walls of the palanquin by no less than thirty-eight thick chains, each one chiselled into the his stone flesh. Copper wiring had been strung across his body at regular intervals, and vague currents of magic could be detected as they flickered from wire to wire.

All in all, Basalt had seen better days... and yet, as the two of them crept closer, they realized he was smiling; he didn't try to escape, or even struggle in the slightest. In fact, unless Elphaba was mistaken, the Nome actually appeared to settle back into his throne as he saw them.

"It's good to see you both again," he whispered hoarsely.

"What... what _happened _to you, Basalt?" Glinda asked.

"It's-" His face briefly contorted, as if suppressing a spasm of pain. "It's all part of my rehabilitation: the wiring draws off excess emotion and memory, channels it away from my soul; the chains stop me from using magic, ensure that I don't hurt any visitors during the downswing; the walls prevent me from leaving my body until the recovery process is complete."

Remembering the hellish psychological condition that Lord Eldrect and his house had been after being unable to leave their bodies, Elphaba asked, "How is that supposed to help you stay sane _or _get the emotions under control? I mean, that's like trying to treat claustrophobia with an isolation tank- it just doesn't work."

"I need... the doctors said I needed to be isolated, to be diluted, d- distilled; until I can distance my memories from those of the King's and learn to cope with the new emotions, I can't leave. It's not all bad: I can still read, after all. And in the end, I have to accept these measures if I want to regain my sanity; if it means being able to think clearly again, to know what I'm feeling, I _have _to accept them."

"But how long is that supposed to take?" Glinda demanded. "Are you going to sit there for the next- I don't know- ten years? Fifty? A hundred? A thousand?"

"It's either that, or risk losing myself to Roquat's memories-"

"And becoming Roquat," Elphaba finished. "I'm amazed the Chamberlain let you out of the palace with a risk like that on his hands. As a matter of fact, why _did_ he let you out of the palace? I don't think he would have taken you on a diplomatic mission just to say hello to us, would he?"

Basalt grinned. "There's been a bit of political upheaval in Nome society since we last saw each other. With no clear line of succession except me, things got very interesting, to say the least..."

"Did they eventually decide on anything, or are they still debating?"

"Well, a bit of both, to be honest."

Glinda laughed. "Spoken like a true politician; are you sure you're not going to be King?"

Now it was Basalt's turn to laugh- loudly and for far too long to be considered sane. "No," he chuckled at last. "I'm not going to be King; I doubt the Chamberlain would want to put the fate of all Nomekind in the hands of yet another madman. Besides, I'm not exactly the most legitimate choice. But without any chosen successor existing at the time of the King's death apart from me, the restructuring government has decided to put the succession to a vote."

"A _vote?_ Since when are you supposed to _vote_ for Kings?"

"It's not unheard of," said Elphaba helpfully. "Elective monarchy's rare in Oz, but that doesn't mean it's never happened before; it just means that a lot of VIPs from the upper echelons of government are going to get together and vote on who's going to be in charge- themselves, if possible."

Basalt nodded. "And it won't be me, thankfully. But in the meantime, because I happen to be a living record of everything King Roquat did, said or thought, the government consider me useful enough to keep around as a consultant to the future King. The libraries of the country are also requesting interviews regarding the magical knowledge that Roquat learned over the course of his long life. I've actually got a little bit of influence now- at least enough to request that I be brought along on this diplomatic venture. In fact, I... I think I might actually have a future in the Nome Dominions." His smile broadened. "The ambassador told me of Queen Ozma's deal with you; it's turning out better than either of us expected, isn't it?"

_You have terrifyingly low standards, Basalt._

Out loud, Elphaba remarked, "Certainly better than spending the rest of my life in the wilderness. But why are the diplomats here?"

"For the sake of continued peace: they know how badly Nomes are viewed in Oz, and they want to prevent any attempt at invasion once your country has been restored to its former strength. So, they are pledging several of our magicians to aid you in the tuition program- though not too many, given that we have reality disruptions of our own to contend with." He sighed. "It's going to be a very busy year. I can only hope the new King will listen to what I have to say."

Glinda smirked. "Oh, I don't know: having one of the assassins who helped kill the last King around? He'll probably be too scared to ignore you."

Once again, Basalt laughed for far too long and far too desperately, his cackling echoing wildly around the iron chamber; halfway through, the wiring on his body sparked violently, abruptly turning the laugh into a piercing scream of terror at some long-vanished vision from Roquat's past. It took several seconds for the fit to pass and the power surge to subside, and by the time it was over, Basalt was wheezing and gasping as if he'd just run a marathon, his body still twitching and shivering.

"Are you alright?" Glinda whispered.

"I'll be fine. These fits come and go; I'm much better than I was... so much better..." He took a deep breath. "As I said, it's going to be a very busy year, and..." He hesitated; if he were human, Basalt would have probably taken this opportunity to bite his lower lip. "I might not be able to see you again: with work and rehabilitation to deal with, I'm not sure if I'll be let out of the palace again in a hurry. So, while I have the chance, I wanted to thank you both for everything you've given me."

"You helped us too, don't forget."

"It's not just the way we saved each other at the end, Glinda: you gave me a name; you gave me trust when you had no reason to do so; you led me to study for the first time. And Elphaba, you helped me choose my way; you let me question what I believed. Both of you gave me so much- I'm not sure if I can ever repay the debt I owe the both of you... But I am prepared to try."

Reaching into a small alcove to his left, he drew a large leather-bound book and handed it to Elphaba. "I know of your attempts to restore Fiyero to human form," he explained. "And I also know that you have forestalled most of them-"

"-because of the Grimmerie," Elphaba finished. "There are some things I'm not willing to risk with its spells, Fiyero's life being one of them. But what is this?" She opened the book, leafing through a few of the pages; whatever it was, it was old, held together almost entirely through magic and expanded far beyond its page limit in much the same way. "Is this some kind of journal or something?"

"Yes- Roquat's, in fact."

"_What?"_

"More precisely, this is a journal that has been owned and written in by every single Nome King in history- specifically for researching our Forefather's technique. Every single aspect, expansion, adaptation and update to the spell is written upon these pages for you to research. It might take time and effort to reapply it for human use, and to prepare a new body for Fiyero to inhabit... but I think you're more than ready for the challenge."

Elphaba stared. "How did you know I'd be able to prepare a-"

"Roquat had been spying on you for quite some time; he knew about your experiments in growing human tissue."

"Basalt, this is a cultural treasure; are you just going to let us borrow this-"

"It's not borrowed; it belongs to you now- _both of you._"

In the awed silence that followed, he once again gave the impression of wanting to bite his lower lip in consternation. "There was one other thing I wanted to give you before I left..." he said at last. "I saw this gesture performed so many times back when I was almost without emotion; at the time, I never really understood the purpose, even when I studied it in detail. After all, when even the logical reasons were grounded in emotion, how could a lowly Protector understand it?" He laughed, quickly sobering. "But you see, now I understand. Now, I know why."

Without saying another word, he awkwardly leaned forward and gently wrapped his column-like arms around both Glinda and Elphaba, hugging them as fiercely as he could without actually hurting them

"Thank you," he said softly, "for everything."

* * *

As the palanquin was slowly hauled back beneath the cobblestones and into the depths of the earth, Basalt reflected that there was one thing that he hadn't told his friends of during the visit. It was one of the many things that always seemed caught within one of the copper loops that now regulated his memory, something he was perpetually forgetting and remembering and forgetting once again.

More than once, he'd reflected that perhaps this process of forgetting was for the good of his sanity- for the memory that caused him such distress was none other than King Roquat's last words, and as always, they were accompanied by the same pain that Basalt had experienced in the moment he'd heard them- the pain of Roquat slowly devouring his soul.

_It can't begin like this,_ a voice had echoed. _I can't just start all over again; I've done so much damage to my contingencies, to my palace- to everything. And I'm... so... tired._

The pain in Basalt's psyche finally began to fade.

_Perhaps it's time to end this story,_ Roquat's voice had echoed. _Perhaps, in the end, I'm simply too old to walk the path any further... but perhaps someone I know can see it through to the end. Goodbye, Protector; may politics be kinder to you than they were to me..._

And those had been the last words of King Roquat the Red, before his soul had finally dissolved into random energies and thoughts, tumbling into the open wound that Basalt had become...

* * *

"This meeting is not taking place," Glinda announced. "You are to tell nobody of the events of today or any other meeting that takes place under this roof, or of who you have met over the course of this meeting, or the objectives of the coursework. Failure to comply with these orders, those of your contract or the _spells _on your contract will result in instant dismissal followed by imprisonment. You have been selected to perform a service for the government of Oz, but that doesn't make you above reproachification: you will learn magic and you will enjoy the various benefits it can grant, but you are still subject to Ozian law. Is that clear?"

There was a chorus of yeses from across the classroom.

The students here had been gathered from all over Oz, each of them representing some wildly different lifestyle: in this classroom, bureaucrats, entrepreneurs and rich kids from Gillkin and the Emerald City rubbed elbows with Munchkin farmers, Quadling hunters and countless others. Nor was age any kind of a barrier: some of the students were as young as twelve, while others were well past retirement age. The only criteria that truly united this diverse group lay in their mutual aptitude for magic: they had each shown a natural inclination towards magical study, a gift for spellcraft- or perhaps something even more impressive. Some had gone out of their way to actually research magic and learn of their true potential; others had found it out largely by accident. Whatever the case, they had each been evaluated for signs of magical ability, selected, and sent a letter regarding their participation in this vital coursework- the reason for which nobody had told them until this morning.

"Another thing I've got to make clear," said Glinda. "Just because a few of you have learned how to cast spells doesn't automatically make you magicians: you have to actually earn the title. And we have magicians with very serious qualifications showing up over the next few weeks; you're going to have to work very hard if you'll want to impress them." She cleared her throat. "Finally, I have to emphasize this: do not panic. With Oz in its current state, we've had to call in some rather unorthodox tutors over the last couple of months; you may be expected to learn magic from Animals, Nomes and various other creatures- and I expect all of you to do so without prejudice or bigotry. Is that clear?"

The room chorused "yes" once more.

"Very well then. Now, allow me to introduce your chief tutor..."

And then, without warning, a familiar figure appeared in the doorway; pausing only to take in the looks of surprise and disbelief on the faces of those around her, she crossed the room without any opposition or even surprise from Glinda, and stood at the head of the chamber. For twelve awful seconds, the students regarded her with abject terror, not knowing whether to run or try to fight, wondering why Glinda could possibly be smiling in all of this. Then, the nightmare standing at the front of the room finally spoke:

"Good Morning, ladies and gentlemen," said the Wicked Witch of the West, smiling gleefully. "Before we begin, I have to warn you: _this _is where it gets complicated..."

THE END

* * *

A/N: Thanks to everyone who's reviewed and enjoyed this story in the last year or so- and I mean _all _of you: A Hopeful Voice, Leia Emberblaze, wickedRENThead1783, nirky, maramouse, GoodWitchesOfOz, Anna Marie Raven, Nami Swannn, Wile E. Coyote, ComingAndGoingByBubble, unusual individual, Inbalwolf, bbfitz, ChaoticSymphonyofDarkness- everyone! I literally couldn't have done this without you. With a tear in either eye, I salute you, apologize for the numerous late chapters, and bid you all a very happy Christmas.

So, does the conclusion mean that there's going to be a sequel to this story? I'm not entirely sure as of yet. I will carry on writing fanfic- after all, I need some way of venting excess lunacy- but as for what the next Wicked fic will be? Who can say?

'Til then, Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!


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